Bilateral osteoma of the internal auditory canal: Case report and literature review

Osteomas of the external auditory canal tend to be rather common; those of the internal auditory canal (IAC) are much rarer, though, with less than twenty cases reported in literature up to this very day. Bilateral IAC osteomas, as in this case, are extremely unusual.These benign bone tumors grow very slowly and this implies that the patient is very often asymptomatic. The diagnosis is generally made relatively late and it is, in many cases, absolutely incidental, with Computed Thomography (CT) scans of the temporal bones performed for other reasons. The manuscript describe the case of a patient complaining with progressive bilateral hearing impairment, worsening in the course of many years; we would like to point out the benefits brought by CT in the diagnosis and therapeutic choice, which is, still today, not yet subject to unanimous consensus. (C) 2014 The College of Radiographers. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Perioperative gabapentin and post cesarean pain control: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials

Cesarean delivery occurs in roughly one third of pregnancies. Effective postoperative pain control is a goal for patients and physicians. Limiting opioid use in this period is important as some percentage of opioid naïve individuals will develop persistent use. Gabapentin is a non-opioid medication that has been used perioperatively to improve postoperative pain and limit opioid requirements. The goal of this study is to determine the efficacy of perioperative gabapentin in improving post cesarean delivery pain control. The following data sources were searched from their inception through October 2018: MEDLINE, Ovid, ClinicalTrials.gov, Sciencedirect, and the Cochrane Library at the CENTRAL Register of Controlled Trials. A systematic review of the literature was performed to include all randomized trials examining the effect of perioperative gabapentin on post cesarean delivery pain control and other postoperative outcomes. The primary outcome was the analgesic effect of gabapentin on post cesarean delivery pain, measured by visual analog scale (VAS; 0-100) or Numerical Rating Scale (NRS; 0-10) on movement 24 hours (h) postoperative. These scores were directly compared by multiplying all NRS scores by a factor of 10. Meta-analysis was performed using the random effects model of DerSimonian and Laird, to produce summary treatment effects in terms of mean difference (MD) with 95% confidence interval (CI). Six placebo controlled trials (n = 645) were identified as relevant and included in the meta-analysis. All studies included only healthy pregnant women (American Society of Anesthesiologist (ASA) physical status I or II) undergoing spinal anesthesia for cesarean delivery at term. Participants were randomized to either 600 mg oral gabapentin or placebo preoperatively and in one study the medications were also continued postoperatively. Pooled data showed that women who received gabapentin prior to cesarean delivery had significantly lower VAS pain scores at 24 h on movement (MD -11.58, 95% CI -23.04 to -0.12). VAS pain scores at other time points at rest or on movement were not significantly different for those who received gabapentin and placebo although there was a general trend toward lower pain scores for women receiving gabapentin. There was no significant between-group difference in use of additional pain medications, supplemental opioids, and maternal or neonatal side effects. There was higher pain control satisfaction at 12 and 24 h in the gabapentin versus placebo groups

Objective Knowledge Mediates the Relationship between the Use of Social Media and COVID-19-Related False Memories

The exposure to relevant social and/or historical events can increase the generation of false memories (FMs). The Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is a calamity challenging health, political, and journalistic bodies, with media generating confusion that has facilitated the spread of fake news. In this respect, our study aims at investigating the relationships between memories (true memories, TMs vs. FMs) for COVID-19-related news and different individual variables (i.e., use of traditional and social media, COVID-19 perceived and objective knowledge, fear of the disease, depression and anxiety symptoms, reasoning skills, and coping mechanisms). One hundred and seventy-one university students (131 females) were surveyed. Overall, our results suggested that depression and anxiety symptoms, reasoning skills, and coping mechanisms did not affect the formation of FMs. Conversely, the fear of loved ones contracting the infection was found to be negatively associated with FMs. This finding might be due to an empathy/prosociality-based positive bias boosting memory abilities, also explained by the young age of participants. Furthermore, objective knowledge (i) predicted an increase in TMs and decrease in FMs and (ii) significantly mediated the relationships between the use of social media and development of both TMs and FMs. In particular, higher levels of objective knowledge strengthened the formation of TMs and decreased the development of FMs following use of social media. These results may lead to reconsidering the idea of social media as the main source of fake news. This claim is further supported by either the lack of substantial differences between the use of traditional and social media among participants reporting FMs or the positive association between use of social media and levels of objective knowledge. The knowledge about the topic rather than the type of source would make a difference in the process of memory formation

A Qualitative Evaluation of IoT-driven eHealth: Knowledge Management, Business Models and Opportunities, Deployment and Evolution

eHealth has a major potential, and its adoption may be considered necessary to achieve increased ambulant and remote medical care, increased quality, reduced personnel needs, and reduced costs potential in healthcare. In this paper the authors try to give a reasonable, qualitative evaluation of IoT-driven eHealth from theoretical and practical viewpoints. They look at associated knowledge management issues and contributions of IoT to eHealth, along with requirements, benefits, limitations and entry barriers. Important attention is given to security and privacy issues. Finally, the conditions for business plans and accompanying value chains are realistically analyzed. The resulting implementation issues and required commitments are also discussed based on a case study analysis. The authors confirm that IoT-driven eHealth can happen and will happen; however, much more needs to be addressed to bring it back in sync with medical and general technological developments in an industrial state-of-the-art perspective and to get recognized and get timely the benefits

Innovation Practices in Emerging Economies: Do University Partnerships Matter?

Enterprises’ resources and capabilities determine their ability to achieve competitive advantage. In this regard, the key innovation challenges that enterprises face are liabilities associated with their age and size, and the entry barriers imposed on them. In this line, a growing number of enterprises are starting to implement innovation practices in which they employ both internal/external flows of knowledge in order to explore/exploit innovation in collaboration with commercial or scientific agents. Within this context, universities play a significant role providing fertile knowledge-intensive environments to support the exploration and exploitation of innovative and entrepreneurial ideas, especially in emerging economies, where governments have created subsidies to promote enterprise innovation through compulsory university partnerships. Based on these ideas, the purpose of this exploratory research is to provide a better understanding about the role of universities on enterprises’ innovation practices in emerging economies. More concretely, in the context of Mexico, we explored the enterprises’ motivations to collaborate with universities in terms of innovation purposes (exploration and exploitation) or alternatives to access to public funds (compulsory requirement of being involved in a university partnership). Using a sample of 10,167 Mexican enterprises in the 2012 Research and Technological Development Survey collected by the Mexican National Institute of Statistics and Geography, we tested a multinomial regression model. Our results provide insights about the relevant role of universities inside enterprises’ exploratory innovation practices, as well as, in the access of R&D research subsidies

A spill over effect of entrepreneurial orientation on technological innovativeness:an outlook of universities and research based spin offs

partially_open5siBy shifting towards Romer’s (Am Econ Rev 94:1002–1037, 1986) economy and so the spread of knowledge economy, universities started to adopt a collaborative approach with their entrepreneurial ecosystem. They turn out to be risk taker, autonomous, proactive, competitive, and innovative. In a nutshell, they are entrepreneurial oriented with the aim to generate new innovative ventures, known as research-based spin offs. Doubly, this has induced an improvement of technology transfer and the degree of entrepreneurship in the current knowledge economy. However there still is a paucity of studies on the spill over effect of entrepreneurial orientated universities and research-based spin off on technology transfer need to be more explored. Therefore, the article investigates the link between entrepreneurial orientation and such spill overs by offering an outlook of two universities and two research-based spin offs in the United Kingdom. The scope is to provide a deep view of technological innovativeness in a research context, entrepreneurial oriented. Our research suggests that entrepreneurial attitude has become an imperative to succeed in the context where British institutions currently operate. Entrepreneurship brings the necessary technological innovation to the university and its students, which results in better positioning of the university at national and international levels, with the subsequent impact on their ability to attract not only new students and academics but also funding to conduct their research.openScuotto, Veronica; Del Giudice, Manlio; Garcia-Perez, Alexeis; Orlando, Beatrice; Ciampi, FrancescoScuotto, Veronica; Del Giudice, Manlio; Garcia-Perez, Alexeis; Orlando, Beatrice; Ciampi, Francesc