Are the Innovative Electronic Labels for Extra Virgin Olive Oil Sustainable, Traceable, and Accepted by Consumers?

Traceability is the ability to follow the displacement of food through its entire chain. Extra virgin olive oil (EVOO) represents Italian excellence, with consumers’ increased awareness for traceability. The aim of this work is to propose and analyze the economic sustainability and consumers’ preference of three technological systems supporting traceability: Near Field Communication (NFC) based; tamper-proof device plus Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) and app; QR code tag plus “scratch and win” system and blockchain. An anonymous questionnaire to Italian consumers (n = 1120) was made to acquire consumers’ acceptability of the systems and estimating their willingness to pay additional premium prices for these. An economic analysis estimated and compared the technology costs at different production levels. Results show that 94% of the consumer respondents are interested in the implementation of such technologies, and among them 45% chose QR-code protected by a “scratch-and-win” system with a blockchain infotracing-platform (QR-B). The consumers interested are willing to pay a mean premium price of 17.8% and economic analysis reported evidenced an incidence always lower than mid-/high-production levels. The success of the QR-B could be ascribed to different aspects: the cutting-edge fashion trend of blockchain in the food sector, the use of incentives, the easy-to-use QR-code, and the gamification strategy

Treatments for intracranial hypertension in acute brain-injured patients: grading, timing, and association with outcome. Data from the SYNAPSE-ICU study

Purpose: Uncertainties remain about the safety and efficacy of therapies for managing intracranial hypertension in acute brain injured (ABI) patients. This study aims to describe the therapeutical approaches used in ABI, with/without intracranial pressure (ICP) monitoring, among different pathologies and across different countries, and their association with six months mortality and neurological outcome. Methods: A preplanned subanalysis of the SYNAPSE-ICU study, a multicentre, prospective, international, observational cohort study, describing the ICP treatment, graded according to Therapy Intensity Level (TIL) scale, in patients with ABI during the first week of intensive care unit (ICU) admission. Results: 2320 patients were included in the analysis. The median age was 55 (I-III quartiles = 39-69) years, and 800 (34.5%) were female. During the first week from ICU admission, no-basic TIL was used in 382 (16.5%) patients, mild-moderate in 1643 (70.8%), and extreme in 295 cases (eTIL, 12.7%). Patients who received eTIL were younger (median age 49 (I-III quartiles = 35-62) vs 56 (40-69) years, p < 0.001), with less cardiovascular pre-injury comorbidities (859 (44%) vs 90 (31.4%), p < 0.001), with more episodes of neuroworsening (160 (56.1%) vs 653 (33.3%), p < 0.001), and were more frequently monitored with an ICP device (221 (74.9%) vs 1037 (51.2%), p < 0.001). Considerable variability in the frequency of use and type of eTIL adopted was observed between centres and countries. At six months, patients who received no-basic TIL had an increased risk of mortality (Hazard ratio, HR = 1.612, 95% Confidence Interval, CI = 1.243-2.091, p < 0.001) compared to patients who received eTIL. No difference was observed when comparing mild-moderate TIL with eTIL (HR = 1.017, 95% CI = 0.823-1.257, p = 0.873). No significant association between the use of TIL and neurological outcome was observed. Conclusions: During the first week of ICU admission, therapies to control high ICP are frequently used, especially mild-moderate TIL. In selected patients, the use of aggressive strategies can have a beneficial effect on six months mortality but not on neurological outcome