Fostering Apprentice Beauticians’ Visual Expertise Through Annotations: A Design Experiment Using the Platform Realto

Professional beauticians regularly perform skin analyses and should be skilled at observing small skin anomalies and skin damages. However, little is done directly for improving their observation skills at school, during their training. In order to foster apprentices’ observation skills of skin anomalies, a new training scheme exploiting annotations and attention-guiding methods through the use of the platform Realto was developed and tested.A second year class of apprentice beauticians (N=9) was given a pre-test on the visual expertise of skin anomalies. Then, for a semester they attended multiple training sessions where firstly teachers explained skin anomaly images with the help of annotations (attention-guiding) and secondly, students were asked to observe other images of the same anomalies, annotate them, and then provide a textual description of the identified anomaly.At the end of the semester, the trained class completed a post-test and a questionnaire, and group interview have been collected. Another group of apprentices (N=19) of the third year who already completed the skin anomaly course was used as baseline. Results showed that the group who participated in the treatment mentioned almost double the amount of details noticed by the baseline group in the post-test; being trained using annotations and the Realto platform proved effective in developing observation skills, compared to normal lessons. Furthermore, apprentices confirmed, both through the questionnaire and the interviews, that they considered annotations useful for improving their observation skills and that using Realto and its annotation facilities was a good way to achieve this result

An efficient decomposition approach for surgical planning

This talk presents an efficient decomposition approach to surgical planning. Given a set of surgical waiting lists (one for each discipline) and an operating theater, the problem is to decide the room-to-discipline assignment for the next planning period (Master Surgical Schedule), and the surgical cases to be performed (Surgical Case Assignment), with the objective of optimizing a score related to priority and current waiting time of the cases. While in general MSS and SCA may be concurrently found by solving a complex integer programming problem, we propose an effective decomposition algorithm which does not require expensive or sophisticated computational resources, and is therefore suitable for implementation in any real-life setting. Our decomposition approach consists in first producing a number of subsets of surgical cases for each discipline (potential OR sessions), and select a subset of them. The surgical cases in the selected potential sessions are then discarded, and only the structure of the MSS is retained. A detailed surgical case assignment is then devised filling the MSS obtained with cases from the waiting lists, via an exact optimization model. The quality of the plan obtained is assessed by comparing it with the plan obtained by solving the exact integrated formulation for MSS and SCA. Nine different scenarios are considered, for various operating theater sizes and management policies. The results on instances concerning a medium-size hospital show that the decomposition method produces comparable solutions with the exact method in much smaller computation time

Time trends of dietary and lifestyle factors and their potential impact on diabetes burden in China

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Mediterranean Diet and Colorectal Cancer: a systematic review

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the third most common cancer worldwide, especially in developed countries where an estimated 60% of all cases occur. There is evidence of a higher risk in Western society whose behaviours are characterised by higher consumption of red and processed meat than in people living along Mediterranean coast, who have a decreased overall cancer mortality correlated to eating habits such as Mediterranean Diet. Aim: This review evaluate the correlation between 3 components of MedD (olive oil, red wine and tomatoes) and incidence and progression of CRC

Relationship between Mediterranean diet and asymptomatic peripheral arterial disease in a population of pre-menopausal women

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Decellularized diaphragmatic muscle drives a constructive angiogenic response in vivo

Skeletal muscle tissue engineering (TE) aims to efficiently repair large congenital and acquired defects. Biological acellular scaffolds are considered a good tool for TE, as decellularization allows structural preservation of tissue extracellular matrix (ECM) and conservation of its unique cytokine reservoir and the ability to support angiogenesis, cell viability, and proliferation. This represents a major advantage compared to synthetic scaffolds, which can acquire these features only after modification and show limited biocompatibility. In this work, we describe the ability of a skeletal muscle acellular scaffold to promote vascularization both ex vivo and in vivo. Specifically, chicken chorioallantoic membrane assay and protein array confirmed the presence of pro-angiogenic molecules in the decellularized tissue such as HGF, VEGF, and SDF-1\u3b1. The acellular muscle was implanted in BL6/J mice both subcutaneously and ortotopically. In the first condition, the ECM-derived scaffold appeared vascularized 7 days post-implantation. When the decellularized diaphragm was ortotopically applied, newly formed blood vessels containing CD31+, \u3b1SMA+, and vWF+ cells were visible inside the scaffold. Systemic injection of Evans Blue proved function and perfusion of the new vessels, underlying a tissue-regenerative activation. On the contrary, the implantation of a synthetic matrix made of polytetrafluoroethylene used as control was only surrounded by vWF+ cells, with no cell migration inside the scaffold and clear foreign body reaction (giant cells were visible). The molecular profile and the analysis of macrophages confirmed the tendency of the synthetic scaffold to enhance inflammation instead of regeneration. In conclusion, we identified the angiogenic potential of a skeletal muscle-derived acellular scaffold and the pro-regenerative environment activated in vivo, showing clear evidence that the decellularized diaphragm is a suitable candidate for skeletal muscle tissue engineering and regeneration

AEI Post, Volume 7

Context: Discovering visual languages across professions is a complex task since it entails discovering a communication system composed of information in image or textual form called representations and also including various kinds of annotations such as notes. Such a task has been previously scarcely considered within research, and basically only investigating in white collar professions (e.g., doctors). This leaves us wondering about all the possible shapes of these vocational visual languages and the potential of using these images to foster learning. For this reason, the current research aims to investigate commonalities and differences of visual languages across vocational professions with the goal of using the outcomes to design educational activities for vocational education and training (VET). Approach: 55 semi-structured interviews have been conducted within eleven professions from the areas of Craftsmanship, Industry, Health and Services such a plumber and fashion designers. The interviews were audio-recorded and analyzed with NVivo through a coding scheme which served as the main reference for the analysis. Findings: Results showed that, in terms of visual representations, professionals use different types of drawings such as technical drawings (e.g., woodworkers), evaluation forms (e.g., dental assistants) and illustrations (e.g., gardeners). For sketches, participants indicate the practice of creating sketches depicting objects to produce (e.g. goldsmiths). For photos, they portrayed things to remember or pay attention to (e.g., chemical technologists). Participants across professions use annotations such as notes to specify details of their job. On the other side, they also report profession-specific annotations such as mathematical symbols like the surface roughness (e.g., polymechanics) and diagrammatic elements like different type of lines to indicate the status of the bones and muscles (e.g., massage therapists) or where to cut textiles (e.g., fashion designers). In terms of communalities, participants within technical professions indicated a shared use of both representations and annotations. Conversely, other professions had very specific visual languages hardly shareable across professions. Conclusion: These results helped in discovering the visual languages of different professions and this knowledge will be used to implement educational activities based on specific skills needed in different professions such as observation skills with the use of VET-specific educational technologies. (DIPF/Orig.

Neural damage biomarkers during open carotid surgery versus endovascular approach

BACKGROUND: Carotid endarterectomy (CEA) is the gold standard for treating severe carotid artery stenosis, whereas carotid artery stenting (CAS) represents an endovascular alternative. The objective of this study was to assess the potential neural damage following open or endovascular carotid surgery measured by peripheral blood concentration of 3 biomarkers: S100β, matrix metalloproteinase-9 (MMP-9), and d-dimer. METHODS: Data for this prospective investigation were obtained from the Carotid Markers study (January 2010-2011), which sought to measure the levels of specific biomarkers of neuronal damage and thrombosis on candidates to CEA or CAS presenting at the Department of Vascular Surgery of the Nuovo Ospedale S. Agostino Estense of Modena (Italy) at baseline and at 24 hr after surgery. Relevant medical comorbidities were noted. RESULTS: A total of 113 consecutive patients were enrolled in the study, 41 in the endarterectomy group and 72 in the endovascular group. The baseline levels of the studied biomarkers did not show any statistically significant difference between the groups with the exception of MMP-9, which showed higher concentrations in the endovascular group (median 731 vs. 401, P = 0.0007), while 24 hr after surgery the endarterectomy group featured significantly higher peripheral blood concentrations of MMP-9, S100β, and d-dimer. Conversely, no significant difference was detected in the endovascular group except the d-dimer level. CONCLUSIONS: Neural damage biomarkers demonstrated a substantial difference between open and endovascular carotid surgery, which, if performed in selected patients, may become a less invasive alternative to CEA

Characterization of four novel bacteriophages targeting multi-drug resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae strains of sequence type 147 and 307

Introduction: the development of alternative antimicrobial strategies is deemed to be a high priority to deal with the challenge caused by the spread of multidrug-resistant (MDR) bacteria in clinical settings. according to several international organizations, phages or components thereof are one of these possible options that could be useful to treat bacterial infections. among the drug-resistant bacteria, carbapenem resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae (CR-Kp) are particularly worrisome, given the extensive MDR profiles, their pandemic dissemination and primary role in healthcare associated and life-threatening infections. In this study we isolated and characterised four lytic bacteriophages targeting two major high-risk clones of CR-Kp circulating in hospital environments, i.e., those belonging to Sequence Type (ST) 307 and ST147. Materials and methods: wastewater samples collected from hospitals located in central Italy were screened for the presence of phages by using a previously characterized collection of K. pneumoniae clinical isolates as hosts and the top-agar overlay technique. host specificity and infection efficiency was assessed by spot test and efficiency of plating, respectively. Dynamic of bacterial infections was determined by the one-step growth curve method. Phages were visualized through transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and their genomes were obtained and analysed by a Next Generation Sequencing approach followed by bioinformatics analysis. Results: four bacteriophages, named GP-1, GP-2, GP-4 and GP-5, have been isolated, purified and produced at high titres. collectively, two phages were able to selectively lyse 12/14 K. pneumoniae strains of ST307, while the other two were active only against all the tested K. pneumoniae strains of ST147 (n=12). phages maintain an overall good stability to temperature and pH changes and were characterized by infection cycles having latency periods ranging from 10 to 50 minutes and burst sizes of 10-100 PFU. results from TEM analysis and genome sequencing demonstrated that the four phages were of different families and allowed to rule out the presence of antibiotic resistance genes, virulence factors or toxins. Discussion and Conclusions: Considering their strictly lytic nature and their high selectivity towards two of the major high-risk clones of K. pneumoniae, the isolated phages can be considered as good candidates for their evaluation in animal models as members of cocktails for applications to treat severe infections caused by CR-Kp strains