Note to subscribers: An annual or monthly subscription is billed to your debit or credit card as ARKANSAS.SUBSTACK.COM and if you have questions, please email arkansas@substack.com. Thanks for reading and subscribing!
The Headlines
Meetings: The North Little Rock City Council will meet next Monday night at City Hall.
Events: Are you ready for back to school? Well, it is coming if you like it or not as Maumelle Charter’s first day of classes is Monday, Aug. 5, just a little more than two weeks away.
Candidate filings begin this month
Wednesday, July 31 is the first day candidates for local office can make it official by filing with the Pulaski County Clerk.
The filing period begins at noon and will conclude at noon on Wednesday, Aug. 7.
For more information on the process, click here for the Pulaski County Clerk.
Running for office? Let us know by replying back or emailing jeremyarkansasnews@gmail.com.
Maumelle’s Lamar Townsend among UALR’s double graduates
The University of Arkansas at Little Rock congratulates its Spring 2024 graduates with multiple degrees.
UA Little Rock awarded more than 1,030 degrees during the Spring 2024 semester. Graduates were honored May 11 at the Jack Stephens Center.
North of the River students who graduated with multiple degrees include:
Lamar Townsend of Maumelle, graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration in Finance and Bachelor of Arts in Political Science.
Maumelle’s Lamar Townsend (Photo by Ben Krain)
Bailey Bishop of Maumelle, graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in English and Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy.
Kenyon Clay of North Little Rock, graduated with an Associate of Science in Law Enforcement and Bachelor of Arts in Criminal Justice.
Marti Hall of Sherwood, graduated with a Master of Public Admininstration and Graduate Certificate in Nonprofit Management.
Maitlyn Harrison of Sherwood, graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in English and Bachelor of Arts in Political Science.
Floyd Hickerson of North Little Rock, graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration in Economics and Bachelor of Business Administration in Finance.
Jamal Hockaday of Sherwood, graduated with a Associate of Applied Science in Crime Scene Investigation, Certificate of Proficiency in Crime Scene Investigation, and Technical Certificate in Crime Scene Investigation.
Stefanie Vestal of North Little Rock, graduated with a Master of Public Service and Graduate Certificate in Communication for Social Change.
North of the River graduates at Arkansas-Little Rock
The University of Arkansas at Little Rock announces its spring 2024 graduates.
More than 1,030 degrees were awarded for the Spring 2024 semester May 11 at the UA Little Rock Jack Stephens Center.
Graduating students participate in the Spring 2024 commencement ceremony. (Photo by Stephen Thornton)
North of the River graduates include:
Lawrence Alexander of Maumelle, who graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies.
Kiara Bradford of Maumelle, who graduated with a Master of Arts in Mass Communications.
Alyssa Burnett of Maumelle, who graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies.
Jackelyn Cordova Romano of Maumelle, who graduated with a Master of Arts in Public History.
Ronald Davis of Maumelle, who graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration in Finance.
Timothy Davis of Maumelle, who graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Engineering Technology-Mechanical.
Benjamin Eades of Maumelle, who graduated with a Associate of Applied Science in Nursing.
Jordan Grice of Maumelle, who graduated with a Bachelor of Science in K-12 Health/Physical Education.
William Holt of Maumelle, who graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in History.
Ashley Johnson of Maumelle, who graduated with a Associate of Applied Science in Nursing.
Rhonda Ortiz of Maumelle, who graduated with a Associate of Applied Science in Nursing.
LaTrisha Williams of Maumelle, who graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing in Nursing.
Triston Wills of Maumelle, who graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration in Management.
For North Little Rock and Sherwood graduates, click here.
UCA announces May 2024 graduates
The University of Central Arkansas held spring commencement on Friday, May 3, and Saturday, May 4, at the Farris Center on campus.
The university conferred approximately 1,600 undergraduate and graduate degrees and certificates from the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences; College of Business; College of Education; College of Health and Behavioral Sciences; College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics; and the Graduate School.
These are the graduates from North of the River:
Kara Kellerman of Maumelle graduated with a Bachelor of Arts.
Mavita Matute of Maumelle graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts.
Faith Mott of Maumelle graduated with a Bachelor of Arts.
Sydney Siler of Maumelle graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts.
Jimmy Coffer of Maumelle graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration.
Makensi Drennan of Maumelle graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration.
Madalyn Knight of Maumelle graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration.
Benjamin Scallion of Maumelle graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration.
Nicole Sumner-Wheeler of Maumelle graduated with a Bachelor of General Studies.
Brianna Fisher of Maumelle graduated with a Bachelor of Science.
Katie Hindmon of Maumelle graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Science.
Ashley Hooper of Maumelle graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Science.
Jenna Johnson of Maumelle graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Science.
Madeline Sims of Maumelle graduated with a Bachelor of Science.
Emily Walsh of Maumelle graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Science.
Logan Cope of Maumelle graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Science in Education.
Jessica Jones of Maumelle graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Education.
Rachel Huey of Maumelle graduated summa cum laude with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing.
Olivia Walker of Maumelle graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing.
Guilherme Luz dos Santos of Maumelle graduated with a Graduate Certificate.
Megan Heaton of Maumelle graduated with a Master of Arts in Teaching.
Keara Graham of Maumelle graduated with a Master of Science.
For North Little Rock and Sherwood students, click here.
UCA names President's List Spring 2024
The University of Central Arkansas congratulates nearly 1,100 students who were named as Presidential Scholars.
Students must achieve a 4.0 GPA with a minimum course load of 12 credit hours to qualify as a Presidential Scholar. The following students from North of the River were named a Presidential Scholar:
Adley Barham of Maumelle
Madison Bisbee of Maumelle
Jewell Callahan of Maumelle
Chacall Charles of Maumelle
Logan Cope of Maumelle
Samyia Googe of Maumelle
Ashley Hooper of Maumelle
Rachel Huey of Maumelle
Jessica Jones of Maumelle
Reilly McCann of Maumelle
William McDonald of Maumelle
Kaylee Munnerlyn of Maumelle
Katharine Nelson of Maumelle
Landry Newsom of Maumelle
Eva Palmer of Maumelle
Andrea Yareni Palos Ornelas of Maumelle
Karter Pawelczak of Maumelle
Hannah Williams of Maumelle
Collin Womack of Maumelle
For North Little Rock and Sherwood students, click here.
Spring 2024 Dean's List
The University of Central Arkansas congratulates more than 1,300 students who were named to the spring 2024 Dean's List.
Eligibility on the Dean's List requires at least a 3.5 GPA with a minimum course load of 12 credit hours. These are the students from North of the River who made the Dean's List.
Eric Nguyen of Maumelle
Kaylee Walsh of Maumelle
Jenna Johnson of Maumelle
Franchelsa Francisco of Maumelle
Sade' Hendrix of Maumelle
Katie Hindmon of Maumelle
Sarah King of Maumelle
Mavita Matute of Maumelle
Jada Simpson of Maumelle
Alex Blair of Maumelle
Asia DeLoach of Maumelle
Lauren Baker of Maumelle
Cade Womack of Maumelle
Lauraine Fosburgh of Maumelle
Kameron Davis of Maumelle
Camryn Joyner of Maumelle
Malingo Matute of Maumelle
Landon Smith of Maumelle
Angela Hoover of Maumelle
Peter Kha of Maumelle
Kailee Massey of Maumelle
Tanner Wenger of Maumelle
Brianna Fisher of Maumelle
Owen Starnes of Maumelle
Brecken Scheiderer of Maumelle
Isabella Blair of Maumelle
Ryan Brekeen of Maumelle
Zachary Clesi of Maumelle
Lauren Cornwell of Maumelle
Morgan Harrison of Maumelle
Kennedy Kittinger of Maumelle
Hannah Matheny of Maumelle
Samuel Schimmel of Maumelle
For North Little Rock and Sherwood students, click here.
Grease the Musical is coming to Argenta Contemporary Theatre in downtown North Little Rock with shows starting next Wednesday, July 24.
Grease is directed by ACT Producing Artistic Director Vincent Insalaco with Sheridan Posey as assistant director and music direction by Tanner Oglesby. The show features Miles Tillemans as Danny Zuko, Sascha Bass as Sandy Dumbrowski and a cast of 20 other teen actors representing high schools and colleges across Arkansas. The role of Mrs. Lynch is played by Valerisse Bell-Ovwlomoriemu.
Shows will run through Aug. 3 with evening shows starting at 7:30 p.m. and the Sunday matinees will be at 2 p.m.
Tickets start at $28 and available online at argentacontemporarytheatre.org.
The show’s sponsors include: Karla & Will Feland, The City of North Little Rock, The Tenenbaum Foundation, Legacy Termite & Pest Control, The Arkansas Arts Council, North Little Rock Tourism and The Insalaco Family. The VIP Balcony is sponsored by Gwatney Chevrolet & Colonial Wine & Spirits.
Medical research has shortchanged women for decades. This is particularly true of older women, leaving physicians without critically important information about how to best manage their health.
Late last year, the Biden administration promised to address this problem with a new effort called the White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research. That inspires a compelling question: What priorities should be on the initiative’s list when it comes to older women?
Navigating Aging focuses on medical issues and advice associated with aging and end-of-life care, helping America’s 45 million seniors and their families navigate the health care system.To contact Judith Graham with a question or comment, click here.
Late last year, the Biden administration promised to address this problem with a new effort called the White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research. That inspires a compelling question: What priorities should be on the initiative’s list when it comes to older women?
Stephanie Faubion, director of the Mayo Clinic’s Center for Women’s Health, launched into a critique when I asked about the current state of research on older women’s health. “It’s completely inadequate,” she told me.
One example: Many drugs widely prescribed to older adults, including statins for high cholesterol, were studied mostly in men, with results extrapolated to women.
Stephanie Faubion, director of the Mayo Clinic’s Center for Women’s Health, launched into a critique when I asked about the current state of research on older women’s health. “It’s completely inadequate,” she told me.
One example: Many drugs widely prescribed to older adults, including statins for high cholesterol, were studied mostly in men, with results extrapolated to women.
“It’s assumed that women’s biology doesn’t matter and that women who are premenopausal and those who are postmenopausal respond similarly,” Faubion said.
“This has got to stop: The FDA has to require that clinical trial data be reported by sex and age for us to tell if drugs work the same, better, or not as well in women,” Faubion insisted.
Consider the Alzheimer’s drug Leqembi, approved by the FDA last year after the manufacturer reported a 27% slower rate of cognitive decline in people who took the medication. A supplementary appendix to a Leqembi study published in the New England Journal of Medicine revealed that sex differences were substantial — a 12% slowdown for women, compared with a 43% slowdown for men — raising questions about the drug’s effectiveness for women.
This is especially important because nearly two-thirds of older adults with Alzheimer’s disease are women. Older women are also more likely than older men to have multiple medical conditions, disabilities, difficulties with daily activities, autoimmune illness, depression and anxiety, uncontrolled high blood pressure, and osteoarthritis, among other issues, according to scores of research studies.
Even so, women are resilient and outlive men by more than five years in the U.S. As people move into their 70s and 80s, women outnumber men by significant margins. If we’re concerned about the health of the older population, we need to be concerned about the health of older women.
As for research priorities, here’s some of what physicians and medical researchers suggested:
Heart Disease
Why is it that women with heart disease, which becomes far more common after menopause and kills more women than any other condition — are given less recommended care than men?
“We’re notably less aggressive in treating women,” said Martha Gulati, director of preventive cardiology and associate director of the Barbra Streisand Women’s Heart Center at Cedars-Sinai, a health system in Los Angeles. “We delay evaluations for chest pain. We don’t give blood thinners at the same rate. We don’t do procedures like aortic valve replacements as often. We’re not adequately addressing hypertension.
“We need to figure out why these biases in care exist and how to remove them.”
Gulati also noted that older women are less likely than their male peers to have obstructive coronary artery disease — blockages in large blood vessels —and more likely to have damage to smaller blood vessels that remains undetected. When they get procedures such as cardiac catheterizations, women have more bleeding and complications.
What are the best treatments for older women given these issues? “We have very limited data. This needs to be a focus,” Gulati said.
Brain Health
How can women reduce their risk of cognitive decline and dementia as they age?
“This is an area where we really need to have clear messages for women and effective interventions that are feasible and accessible,” said JoAnn Manson, chief of the Division of Preventive Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston and a key researcher for the Women’s Health Initiative, the largest study of women’s health in the U.S.
Numerous factors affect women’s brain health, including stress — dealing with sexism, caregiving responsibilities, and financial strain — which can fuel inflammation. Women experience the loss of estrogen, a hormone important to brain health, with menopause. They also have a higher incidence of conditions with serious impacts on the brain, such as multiple sclerosis and stroke.
“Alzheimer’s disease doesn’t just start at the age of 75 or 80,” said Gillian Einstein, the Wilfred and Joyce Posluns Chair in Women’s Brain Health and Aging at the University of Toronto. “Let’s take a life course approach and try to understand how what happens earlier in women’s lives predisposes them to Alzheimer’s.”
Mental Health
What accounts for older women’s greater vulnerability to anxiety and depression?
Studies suggest a variety of factors, including hormonal changes and the cumulative impact of stress. In the journal Nature Aging, Paula Rochon, a professor of geriatrics at the University of Toronto, also faulted “gendered ageism,” an unfortunate combination of ageism and sexism, which renders older women “largely invisible,” in an interview in Nature Aging.
Helen Lavretsky, a professor of psychiatry at UCLA and past president of the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry, suggests several topics that need further investigation. How does the menopausal transition impact mood and stress-related disorders? What nonpharmaceutical interventions can promote psychological resilience in older women and help them recover from stress and trauma? (Think yoga, meditation, music therapy, tai chi, sleep therapy, and other possibilities.) What combination of interventions is likely to be most effective?
Cancer
How can cancer screening recommendations and cancer treatments for older women be improved?
Supriya Gupta Mohile, director of the Geriatric Oncology Research Group at the Wilmot Cancer Institute at the University of Rochester, wants better guidance about breast cancer screening for older women, broken down by health status. Currently, women 75 and older are lumped together even though some are remarkably healthy and others notably frail.
Recently, the U. S. Preventive Services Task Force noted “the current evidence is insufficient to assess the balance of benefits and harms of screening mammography in women 75 years or older,” leaving physicians without clear guidance. “Right now, I think we’re underscreening fit older women and overscreening frail older women,” Mohile said.
The doctor also wants more research about effective and safe treatments for lung cancer in older women, many of whom have multiple medical conditions and functional impairments. The age-sensitive condition kills more women than breast cancer.
“For this population, it’s decisions about who can tolerate treatment based on health status and whether there are sex differences in tolerability for older men and women that need investigation,” Mohile said.
Bone Health, Functional Health, and Frailty
How can older women maintain mobility and preserve their ability to take care of themselves?
Osteoporosis, which causes bones to weaken and become brittle, is more common in older women than in older men, increasing the risk of dangerous fractures and falls. Once again, the loss of estrogen with menopause is implicated.
“This is hugely important to older women’s quality of life and longevity, but it’s an overlooked area that is understudied,” said Manson of Brigham and Women’s.
Jane Cauley, a distinguished professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Public Health who studies bone health, would like to see more data about osteoporosis among older Black, Asian, and Hispanic women, who are undertreated for the condition. She would also like to see better drugs with fewer side effects.
Marcia Stefanick, a professor of medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine, wants to know which strategies are most likely to motivate older women to be physically active. And she’d like more studies investigating how older women can best preserve muscle mass, strength, and the ability to care for themselves.
“Frailty is one of the biggest problems for older women, and learning what can be done to prevent that is essential,” she said.
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.
Kids Run the Bases: Kids 13 and under are invited to run the same basepaths the Travs run after the game.
Sunday, 1:35 p.m.
Operation: Military Appreciation: Service Members get $3 off General Admission and Field Reserved tickets by presenting a Military ID (only available at DSP Box Office) | Presented By Mid-South Ford Dealers
Family Sunday: Get $2 General Admission tickets by presenting a physical or digital church bulletin (only available at DSP Box Office)
Kids Run the Bases: Kids 13 and under are invited to run the same basepaths the Travs run after the game.
At Northwest Arkansas, July 23-28
Pandemic deaths unknown
The state Department of Health again didn’t have a Covid report available for this week. The last report made available to the public was in April. We have continued efforts to get updated numbers but they’ve proven to be fruitless, which, I suppose, is the point. The virus has killed 13,920 Arkansans since the pandemic began four years ago. That would mean the pandemic death toll has now passed Marion’s 13,635 people, the state’s 29th largest city.
Covid toolkit
There’s now a one-stop shop to learn about vaccination sites and other Covid related information. Click here to learn more.
If you don’t want to get sick and die, there’s some things you can do:
