Experts on Mild Cognitive Impairment

Cynthia Barton is a nurse practitioner who specializes in treating the elderly. She completed her basic nursing education at Mary Hitchcock Memorial Hospital in Hanover, N.H. She earned a bachelor of science in nursing at UCSF and a master of science in nursing from Duke University. She is certified as a gerontological nurse practitioner by the American Nurses Credentialing Center. Barton speaks in the community on the topics of cognition in the elderly, cognitive assessment and non-pharmacological management of behavior problems in dementia.

Rosalie Gearhart is the administrative nurse for the UCSF Memory and Aging Center. She works with families during diagnostic visits and cares for patients in the follow-up clinic. Gearhart works to help maintain the quality of life of patients and caregivers. She is interested in studying people at risk for dementia, the prevention of decline and the impact of caregiving on families, particularly families involved in the care of frontotemporal dementia patients.

Gearhart earned her undergraduate degree in nursing at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. She began her nursing career at Johns Hopkins Hospital and worked in general medicine at UCSF Medical Center where she was nurse manager. She earned a master's in nursing administration at UCSF and is a gerontological clinical nurse specialist, certified by the American Nurses Association Credentialing Center. She is an assistant clinical professor in the physiology department of the UCSF School of Nursing.

Jennifer Merrilees is a clinical nurse specialist in geriatrics at the UCSF Memory and Aging Center where she works with patients and families in the assessment and management of cognitive function, behavior and caregiving issues. Merrilees received her master's degree in nursing from the University of California, San Francisco and is certified by the American Nurses Association in Gerontological Nursing. Merrilees has 10 years experience working with elders and their families. Previously she worked with hospitalized elderly at UCSF Medical Center. As an assistant clinical professor, Merrilees taught in the UCSF graduate program in Gerontological nursing with primary responsibility in clinical training and supervision of master's nursing students. She is involved in outreach programs at Self-Help for the Elderly, which serves Chinese elderly and Laguna Honda Hospital, a long-term care facility. Merrilees 'scurrent work focuses primarily on frontotemporal dementia and the issues faced by family caregivers.

Christina Wyss-Coray is a clinical nurse at the UCSF Memory and Aging Center where she meets with patients and families on the appointment day, evaluates caregiver issues and performs functional, behavioral and memory assessments. In addition, Wyss-Coray organizes and oversees follow-up appointments and follows patients and families through the course of enrollment at the center. Wyss-Coray graduated from Nursing College in Chur, Switzerland in 1987. She worked as a clinical nurse and charge nurse for six years in a university hospital in Switzerland. In 1993, Wyss-Coray moved to the United States with her family and in 1996 joined the Intensive Care Unit at UCSF. In 1999, she came to the Memory and Aging Center.

As a clinical pharmacist with the UCSF Memory and Aging Center for over 15 years, Richard Ronald Finley collaborates with the members of the medical team to optimize drug therapy, conducts medication history interviews and meets with patients and caregivers to discuss questions/issues regarding traditional and nontraditional medications. He has a strong interest in geriatric drug therapy and medications for dementia.

Finley received his bachelor's degree in pharmacy at St. Louis College of Pharmacy in Missouri. In addition, he is a consultant pharmacist for the On Lok-Senior Health program and the Institute on Aging Alzheimer's Day Care Program. He is co-chair of pharmacy practice at the California Geriatric Education Center as well as a lecturer, and member of the faculty since 1980, in the department of clinical pharmacy, School of Pharmacy at UCSF.

Julene K. Johnson is a cognitive neuroscientist and assistant professor at the UCSF Memory and Aging Center. In addition, she helps coordinate the California Frontotemporal Dementia Consortium. Her research interests include cognitive and neuropathological studies of Mild Cognitive Impairment, Alzheimer's disease, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease and healthy aging. She also studies language and music abilities in dementia. Johnson received her doctorate in cognitive neuroscience from the University of Texas at Dallas and a bachelor's of music from Southern Methodist University in Dallas. She did her postdoctoral training with Dr. Carl Cotman at the University of California, Irvine where she studied clinical and neuropathological features of Alzheimer's disease and healthy aging.

Joel Kramer is director of the UCSF Memory and Aging Center Neuropsychology program. Kramer has been extensively involved in studying the cognitive changes associated with brain disorders for the past two decades. Presently, his active areas of research include studying the cognitive effects of cerebrovascular disease and frontotemporal dementia, identifying behavioral markers of pre-clinical Alzheimer's disease and understanding the relationships between aging, hormones and behavior.

Kramer earned his doctorate at Baylor University in Waco, Texas, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Martinez VA Hospital. Kramer is board certified in clinical neuropsychology and serves on the board of directors of the American Academy of Clinical Neuropsychology. In addition, he is an associate clinical professor of neurology, psychiatry and pediatrics at UCSF.

Katherine Rankin is a neuropsychologist who works with dementia patients at the UCSF Memory and Aging Center. She assesses the cognitive function of patients for both clinical and research evaluations. Rankin specializes in research that examines the neuroanatomy of the altered personalities of patients as well as social behavior that sometimes results from dementia.

Rankin received her undergraduate degree in psychology from Yale University, where she worked at the Genetic Epidemiology Research Unit at the Yale School of Medicine. She earned a graduate degree in theology and a doctorate in clinical psychology at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena. During her training, she conducted research through the Alzheimer's Disease Research Center at the University of Southern California as well as the Harbor UCLA Medical Center. Rankin completed her doctorate internship training at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Martinez and UC Davis Medical Center. She went on to complete a two-year postdoctoral fellowship in neuropsychology at UCSF Medical Center, where she is currently an assistant adjunct professor in the neurology department.

Tricia received her Bachelors degree in biology with a concentration in genetics from Cornell University, followed by a Masters degree from The Johns Hopkins University/National Human Genome Research Institute Genetic Counseling Training Program in 2005. Tricia is a board certified genetic counselor.

Tricia joined the Memory and Aging Center in August 2008 and is delighted to be part of such a knowledgeable and dynamic team. Her responsibilities include providing genetic counseling to individuals and families affected with or at-risk for degenerative brain diseases and working in conjunction with the team to better understand the underlying genetic factors.