Ozonized sunflower seeds oil in the treatment of pressure ulcers

Ozone therapy can be defined as a bio-oxidative therapy in which the ozone is administered through different routes (gaseous, dissolved in water or oil) to obtain a beneficial effect in a living system sick. Ozone has many actions that have encouraged the use of this molecule in the field of dentistry, orthopedics and dermatology. In fact, ozone has the following properties: antimicrobial, immunostimulant, antihypoxic, biosynthetic, analgesic and hemostatic. The substrates containing unsaturated lipids react with the O2/O3 gas mixture causing the formation of derivatives ozonized therapeutically active. The therapeutic use of ozone gas for the treatment of skin diseases is unwieldy and for this reason the ozonated oils may represent a valid alternative. The oil extracted from the seeds of sunflower is characterized by a high percentage of unsaturated fatty acids and a low content of saturated fatty acids. Ozonation of sunflower seeds oil leads to the formation of ozonides of linoleic acid which possess high stability (up to 15 years). The daily application of ozonized oils in pressure ulcers has resulted in the rapid disappearance of bacterial superinfection and the formation of granulation tissue, which favored the reduction of the affected are

Trattato di Diritto dell'Ambiente - Vol. II: I procedimenti Amministrativi per la tutela dell'ambiente - Capitolo 10: L'accertamento del danno ambientale

Il Trattato si compone di tre volumi, con i quali si d\ue0 conto in modo pressoch\ue9 completo dell'evoluzione del diritto dell'ambiente, della sua collocazione nell'ordinamento giuridico generale e delle normative di settore che ne costituiscono il corpo disciplinare. Alla luce di ci\uf2, l'approccio dei singoli contributi di ognuno dei tre volumi del Trattato vuole essere eminentemente pratico, senza tuttavia rinunciare ad una pi\uf9 generale e sistematica riflessione intorno alla problematiche che vengono affrontate. E pour cause, verrebbe da ribadire, poich\ue9 il diritto dell'ambiente intercetta s\uec problemi, ed anche bisogni ed emergenze, a carattere concreto ma svolge, altres\uec, una funzione maieutica delineando soluzioni utili ed efficaci per molti problemi, anche al di fuori (oppure oltre) i confini della materia strettamente ambientale

Effect of homotaurine in patients with cognitive impairment: Results from an Italian observational retrospective study

Background & Aims: This observational retrospective study aimed at evaluating the effects of one-year administration of homotaurine (tramiprosate) in a sample patients presenting with symptoms of mild cognitive impairment. Methods: Patient’s demographic data and medical history are reported. Each patient performed brain imaging and neuropsychological assessment to reach the diagnosis. Each patient assumed 100 mg total dose of homotaurine/day. The evolution of the cognitive decline over time was evaluated my means of the Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE). Results: 245 patients from 28 different centres in Italy were recruited. Significant improvements from baseline expressed as mean MMSE total score were observed in patients with aMCI at months 8 and 12 (p < 0.0001), and in those with mMCI at month 4 (p < 0.05). Conclusions: Administration of homotaurine revealed beneficial effects in our sample population of MCI patients. Our results indicate clearly that homotaurine may well be considered as a potential symptomatic treatment for cognitive symptoms. Further research is however needed to clarify whether this compound could influence the progression of cognitive decline

Predicting functional impairment trajectories in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: a probabilistic, multifactorial model of disease progression

Objective: To employ Artificial Intelligence to model, predict and simulate the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) progression over time in terms of variable interactions, functional impairments, and survival. Methods: We employed demographic and clinical variables, including functional scores and the utilisation of support interventions, of 3940 ALS patients from four Italian and two Israeli registers to develop a new approach based on Dynamic Bayesian Networks (DBNs) that models the ALS evolution over time, in two distinct scenarios of variable availability. The method allows to simulate patients’ disease trajectories and predict the probability of functional impairment and survival at different time points. Results: DBNs explicitly represent the relationships between the variables and the pathways along which they influence the disease progression. Several notable inter-dependencies were identified and validated by comparison with literature. Moreover, the implemented tool allows the assessment of the effect of different markers on the disease course, reproducing the probabilistically expected clinical progressions. The tool shows high concordance in terms of predicted and real prognosis, assessed as time to functional impairments and survival (integral of the AU-ROC in the first 36 months between 0.80–0.93 and 0.84–0.89 for the two scenarios, respectively). Conclusions: Provided only with measurements commonly collected during the first visit, our models can predict time to the loss of independence in walking, breathing, swallowing, communicating, and survival and it can be used to generate in silico patient cohorts with specific characteristics. Our tool provides a comprehensive framework to support physicians in treatment planning and clinical decision-making

The epidemiology and treatment of ALS: focus on the heterogeneity of the disease and critical appraisal of therapeutic trials.

Effective treatments for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) have remained elusive. Only riluzole, a drug thought to affect glutamate metabolism, improves survival albeit to modest extent. Explanations for the negative results of therapeutic trials include a likely heterogeneity, both in disease susceptibility and pathogenic mechanisms, and faulty methodology of clinical trials. Further understanding of these factors will lead to improvements in patient stratification, and in the design of future clinical tria

A Multicentric Prospective Incidence Study of Guillain-Barre Syndrome in Italy. the ITANG Study

To assess Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS) incidence we relied on the Italian Network for the study of GBS (ITANG) established in 2010 in 7 Italian regions to analyse the association between influenza vaccination and GBS. Methods: All individuals aged 6518 years, presenting with clinical manifestations that suggested GBS according to the universally accepted Asbury's diagnostic criteria (1990) were prospectively notified to a centralised database by ITANG neurologists over the period October 1, 2010-September 30, 2011. Through a telephone survey, 9 trained interviewers followed up the cases to diagnosis and then for 1 year since hospital discharge. Validation of case reporting was performed with the support of administrative data in 5 regions. Results: We found 365 cases fulfilling the definition for GBS or one of its variants over 19,846,068 population 6518 years of age, yielding an annual incidence rate of 1.84 per 100,000 (95% CI 1.65-2.03), 2.30 (95% CI 1.99-2.60) in men and 1.41 (95% CI 1.18-1.64) in women. A highly significant peak of incidence was observed in February 2011 as compared to reference month (September 2011, rate ratio 3.3:1, p < 0.01). Conclusions: In Italy, GBS incidence was among the highest reported in Europe and higher than previously observed in Italian studies

Risk of Guillain-Barré syndrome after 2010-2011 influenza vaccination.

Influenza vaccination has been implicated in Guillain Barré Syndrome (GBS) although the evidence for this link is controversial. A case-control study was conducted between October 2010 and May 2011 in seven Italian Regions to explore the relation between influenza vaccination and GBS. The study included 176 GBS incident cases aged ≥18 years from 86 neurological centers. Controls were selected among patients admitted for acute conditions to the Emergency Department of the same hospital as cases. Each control was matched to a case by sex, age, Region and admission date. Two different analyses were conducted: a matched case-control analysis and a self-controlled case series analysis (SCCS). Case-control analysis included 140 cases matched to 308 controls. The adjusted matched odds ratio (OR) for GBS occurrence within 6 weeks after influenza vaccination was 3.8 (95 % CI: 1.3, 10.5). A much stronger association with gastrointestinal infections (OR = 23.8; 95 % CI 7.3, 77.6) and influenza-like illness or upper respiratory tract infections (OR = 11.5; 95 % CI 5.6, 23.5) was highlighted. The SCCS analysis included all 176 GBS cases. Influenza vaccination was associated with GBS, with a relative risk of 2.1 (95 % CI 1.1, 3.9). According to these results the attributable risk in adults ranges from two to five GBS cases per 1,000,000 vaccinations