A multi-element psychosocial intervention for early psychosis (GET UP PIANO TRIAL) conducted in a catchment area of 10 million inhabitants: study protocol for a pragmatic cluster randomized controlled trial

Multi-element interventions for first-episode psychosis (FEP) are promising, but have mostly been conducted in non-epidemiologically representative samples, thereby raising the risk of underestimating the complexities involved in treating FEP in 'real-world' services

COB seismic rehabilitation

Among the different earth architectural techniques largely diffused in the Italian regions - rammed earth, various types of “adobe”, light earth and cob – the last one is the less known due to its prevalent use in traditional rural buildings and in a few small settlements in Central Italy, partially abandoned in the last years 50/60. Only recently the administrations of the Regions where the majority of this cultural heritage is located developed an interest in cob technique and earth architecture, mainly in Marche and Abruzzo regions. Conservation and ecological interest are the main aim of the local groups which have to face the very “heavy” task to cope with national technical norms, particularly seismic ones which do not include traditional earth based building technologies. A detailed study has been carried out to assess the technological and structural pathologies of a typical rural residence in Treia (Macerata Council, Marche Region) now abandoned in critical conditions due to the lack of maintenance and to the destructive use of concrete and bricks in previous repair interventions. An appropriate technological and cultural sound restoration was proposed along with a structural improvement taking into account the seismic hazard of the area, by means of a wooden grid included into the outside façade of the cob structure. Seismic forecast performance of the proposed system is based on the experience of the Colombian research group “Tierra Viva Foundation” and was studied also by means of a numerical modelling

A New Attenuation Law of Macroseismic Intensity

A few aspects of seismic hazard and risk are discussed in this paper, with "particular " reference to Italian conditions. In the field of hazard analysis, a new attenuation la w of miccroseismic intensity with epicentral distance, is presented. Then two aspects of seismic risk analysis are discusasd, namely: 1) the distribution of resources devoted to seismic risk prevention among sites of different seismicity, and 2) the global cost-benefit ratio which is implicit in the Italian code

Attenuation Law and Local Hazard Evaluation

The paper refers to the attenuation of macroseisrnic intensity with epicentral distance. A new attenuation law is discussed, with particular reference to Italian conditions. For earthquakes of many Italian seismic regions, the new formula shows a much better fitting compared to traditional attenuation laws. The probabilistic approach to the evaluation of local hazard is then discussed under the Poissonian hypothesis for the occurrence process, with particular attention to the computational errors due to the (possible) non homogeneous spatial distribution of epicenters. A simple way to reduce such errors is suggested. Finally, the case in which the occurrence process does not comply with the Poissonian hypothesis is briefly discussed