Business networks along innovation life cycle

Purpose – The paper aims to investigate how the relationships among the various actors within the business networks affect the evolution of innovation through steps of the technology life cycle. Design/methodology/approach – The study is supported by a longitudinal case study referring to a mechanical company operating in the knitting machinery industry. A triangulation method, integrating multiple data sources in a multiple method design, was used to gather data. Findings – The longitudinal study supports the idea that interactions among the actors within the business networks heavily influence the evolution of technology. Research limitations/implications – Although the longitudinal case study reported in the paper refers to a period of about ten years, our findings refer only to a single case study in a specific sector and cannot be generalized. Practical implications – The paper provides important guidelines on how to manage the relationships emerging within a business network in order to influence the development of new technologies. Originality/value – The paper contributes to business networks literature, filling the gaps in information about how the relationships among the actors involved in a network can evolve over time and influence the evolution of technology itself

Seroprevalence of anti-SARS-CoV-2 IgG among healthcare workers of a large university hospital in Milan, Lombardy, Italy: a cross-sectional study

Objectives To assess the seroprevalence of anti-SARS-CoV-2 IgG among health careworkers (HCWs) in our university hospital and verify the risk of acquiring the infection according to work area.Design Cross-sectional study.Setting Monocentric, Italian, third-level university hospital.Participants All the employees of the hospital on a voluntary base, for a total of 4055 participants among 4572 HCWs (88.7%).Primary and secondary outcome measures Number of anti-SARS-CoV-2 positive serology according to working area. Association of anti-SARS-CoV-2 positive serology to selected variables (age, gender, country of origin, body mass index, smoking, symptoms and contact with confirmed cases).Results From 27 April 2020 to 12 June 2020, 4055 HCWs were tested and 309 (7.6%) had a serological positive test. No relevant difference was found between men and women (8.3% vs 7.3%, p=0.3), whereas a higher prevalence was observed among foreign-born workers (27/186, 14.5%, p<0.001), employees younger than 30 (64/668, 9.6%, p=0.02) or older than 60 years (38/383, 9.9%, p=0.02) and among healthcare assistants (40/320, 12.5%, p=0.06). Working as frontline HCWs was not associated with an increased frequency of positive serology (p=0.42). A positive association was found with presence and number of symptoms (p<0.001). The symptoms most frequently associated with a positive serology were taste and smell alterations (OR 4.62, 95% CI: 2.99 to 7.15) and fever (OR 4.37, 95% CI: 3.11 to 6.13). No symptoms were reported in 84/309 (27.2%) HCWs with positive IgG levels. Declared exposure to a suspected/confirmed case was more frequently associated (p<0.001) with positive serology when the contact was a family member (19/94, 20.2%) than a patient or colleague (78/888, 8.8%).Conclusions SARS-CoV-2 infection occurred undetected in a large fraction of HCWs and it was not associated with working in COVID-19 frontline areas. Beyond the hospital setting, exposure within the community represents an additional source of infection for HCWs

Validation of intensive care unit-acquired infection surveillance in the Italian SPIN-UTI network

Validity is one of the most critical factors concerning surveillance of nosocomial infections (NIs). This article describes the first validation study of the Italian Nosocomial Infections Surveillance in Intensive Care Units (ICUs) project (SPIN-UTI) surveillance data. The objective was to validate infection data and thus to determine the sensitivity, specificity, and positive and negative predictive values of NI data reported on patients in the ICUs participating in the SPIN-UTI network. A validation study was performed at the end of the surveillance period. All medical records including all clinical and laboratory data were reviewed retrospectively by the trained physicians of the validation team and a positive predictive value (PPV), a negative predictive value (NPV), sensitivity and specificity were calculated. Eight ICUs (16.3%) were randomly chosen from all 49 SPIN-UTI ICUs for the validation study. In total, the validation team reviewed 832 patient charts (27.3% of the SPIN-UTI patients). The PPV was 83.5% and the NPV was 97.3%. The overall sensitivity was 82.3% and overall specificity was 97.2%. Over- and under-reporting of NIs were related to misinterpretation of the case definitions and deviations from the protocol despite previous training and instructions. The results of this study are useful to identify methodological problems within a surveillance system and have been used to plan retraining for surveillance personnel and to design and implement the second phase of the SPIN-UTI project

Genomic characterization of hepatoid tumors: context matters

Hepatoid tumors (HT) are rare neoplasms, morphologically resembling hepatocellular carcinoma, which arise in several organs other than the liver. A comprehensive molecular profile of this group of neoplasms is still lacking. Genomic characterization of 19 HT from different organs (3 colon, 4 esophagogastric, 4 biliary, 6 genitourinary, 2 lung) was performed using a multigene next-generation sequencing panel. NGS unraveled a composite molecular profile of HT. Their genetic alterations were clearly clustered by tumor site: i) colorectal HT displayed microsatellite instability, high tumor mutational burden, mutations in ARID1A/B genes and NCOA4-RET gene fusion (2/3 cases); ii) gastric HT had TP53 mutations (2/4); iii) biliary HT displayed loss of CDKN2A (3/4) and loss of chromosome 18 (2/4); iv) genital HT showed gain of chromosome 12 (3/6); v) lung HT had STK11 somatic mutations (2/2). The only commonly mutated gene occurring in HT of different sites was TP53 (8/19 cases: 2 colon, 2 esophagogastric, 2 biliary, 1 genital, 1 lung). This study shows that most genetic alterations of HT were clustered by site, indicating that context matters. The novel potential targets for HT precision oncology are also clustered based on the anatomic origin. This study shed light into the biology of these rare cancers, and may have important consequences for treatment decision and clinical trial selection for HT patients