Search results for " Positive"

Liver Steatosis and Fibrosis in OSA patients After Long-term CPAP Treatment: A Preliminary Ultrasound Study.

2015

In cases of morbid obesity, obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) was associated with biopsy-proven liver damage. The role of non-invasive techniques to monitor liver changes during OSA treatment with continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) is unknown. We used non-invasive ultrasound techniques to assess liver steatosis and fibrosis in severe OSA patients at diagnosis and during long-term CPAP treatment. Fifteen consecutive patients with severe OSA (apnea hypopnea index 52.5 ± 19.1/h) were studied by liver ultrasound and elastography (Fibroscan) at 6-mo (n = 3) or 1-y (n = 12) follow-up. Mean age was 49.3 ± 11.9 y, body mass index (BMI) was 35.4 ± 6.4 kg/m(2). Adherence to CPAP was ≥5 h/night. A…

Changing aetiological factors of hepatocellular carcinoma and their potential impact on the effectiveness of surveillance

2011

BACKGROUND: The aetiological factors of hepatocellular carcinoma may vary over time. AIMS: The study assessed the potential impact of the aetiological factors on the effectiveness of surveillance in real-world patients. METHODS: Multicentre, cross-sectional study enrolling consecutive hepatocellular carcinoma cases during a six month period. RESULTS: 1733 cases (1311 prevalent and 422 incident) were recruited (mean age 68.6 years; 46.1% cases over 70 years; 73.9% males; 95.3% with cirrhosis); 63.0% were hepatitis C virus positive and 23.7% were virus negative. Amongst incident HCCs, 34.5% were single ≤3cm and 54.4% met the Milan criteria; 61.6% were diagnosed during surveillance; virus nega…

Characteristics of HCV positive subjects referring to hospitals in Italy: a multicentre prevalence study on 6,999 cases.

2006

In 2001, 6,999 anti-HCV positive subjects referred to 79 Italian hospital in a 6 months enrollment period were evaluated. Of them, 5,632 (80.5%) tested anti-HCV positive alone, 1,163 (16.6%) reported also an excessive alcohol intake, and 204 (2.9%) were also HBsAg positive. Normal biochemistry was observed in 7.8% of cases, chronic hepatitis in 67.9% of cases, liver cirrhosis in 18.9% of cases, and hepatocellular carcinoma in 3.6% cases. HCV positive subjects with excessive alcohol intake were statistically significantly younger, of male sex, and having more severe liver disease than those without excessive alcohol intake. Adjusting for the confounding effect of age and sex by multiple logi…

Ultrasonography and alpha-fetoprotein in diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma in cirrhosis

1988

The accuracy of ultrasound (US) and alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) in the diagnosis of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in 363 patients with cirrhosis (C) and a clinical suspicion of HCC was assessed. The ultrasonographic patterns of HCC and their relationship with AFP values were analyzed. Echographic patterns were distributed as follows: 47 patients had sonodense lesions; 30 patients had hypoechoic lesions; 47 had mixed-pattern lesions, and in four patients focal dilated intrahepatic bile ducts were demonstrated. The sensitivity of US was 90%; specificity was 93.3%. Serum AFP level greater than or equal to 500 ng/ml (RIA) was the first clue to the diagnosis in 71 patients (48.6%); specificity was …

2020

Nasal continuous positive airway pressure (NCPAP) devices using variable (vf-) and continuous (cf-) flow or synchronized nasal intermittent positive pressure ventilation (s-NIPPV) are used to prevent or treat intermittent hypoxia (IH) in preterm infants. Results concerning which is most effective vary. We aimed to investigate the effect of s-NIPPV and vf-NCPAP compared to cf-NCPAP on the rate of IH episodes. Preterm infants with a gestational age of 24.9–29.7 weeks presenting with IH while being treated with cf-NCPAP were monitored for eight hours, then randomized to eight hours of treatment with vf-NCPAP or s-NIPPV. Data from 16 infants were analyzed. Due to an unexpectedly low sample size…

High versus low positive end-expiratory pressure during general anaesthesia for open abdominal surgery (PROVHILO trial): a multicentre randomised con…

2014

BACKGROUND: The role of positive end-expiratory pressure in mechanical ventilation during general anaesthesia for surgery remains uncertain. Levels of pressure higher than 0 cm H(2)O might protect against postoperative pulmonary complications but could also cause intraoperative circulatory depression and lung injury from overdistension. We tested the hypothesis that a high level of positive end-expiratory pressure with recruitment manoeuvres protects against postoperative pulmonary complications in patients at risk of complications who are receiving mechanical ventilation with low tidal volumes during general anaesthesia for open abdominal surgery. METHODS: In this randomised controlled tri…

Effect of Intraoperative High Positive End-Expiratory Pressure (PEEP) with Recruitment Maneuvers vs Low PEEP on Postoperative Pulmonary Complications…

2019

Importance: An intraoperative higher level of positive end-expiratory positive pressure (PEEP) with alveolar recruitment maneuvers improves respiratory function in obese patients undergoing surgery, but the effect on clinical outcomes is uncertain. Objective: To determine whether a higher level of PEEP with alveolar recruitment maneuvers decreases postoperative pulmonary complications in obese patients undergoing surgery compared with a lower level of PEEP. Design, Setting, and Participants: Randomized clinical trial of 2013 adults with body mass indices of 35 or greater and substantial risk for postoperative pulmonary complications who were undergoing noncardiac, nonneurological surgery un…

A smart and operator independent system to delineate tumours in Positron Emission Tomography scans

2018

Abstract Positron Emission Tomography (PET) imaging has an enormous potential to improve radiation therapy treatment planning offering complementary functional information with respect to other anatomical imaging approaches. The aim of this study is to develop an operator independent, reliable, and clinically feasible system for biological tumour volume delineation from PET images. Under this design hypothesis, we combine several known approaches in an original way to deploy a system with a high level of automation. The proposed system automatically identifies the optimal region of interest around the tumour and performs a slice-by-slice marching local active contour segmentation. It automa…

Note psicocriminologiche. La mafia tra antropologia criminale e psichiatria

2022

Nella riflessione intorno all’oggetto “mafia” l’intreccio tra campi del sapere diversi è stato, e continua a essere, indispensabile. Le definizioni della mafia si sono infatti storicamente prodotte all’intersezione tra politica, società e diritto. Da quale prospettiva, dunque, antropologi e psichiatri hanno considerato il comportamento mafioso e l’appartenenza al sodalizio mafioso, specie in relazione alla dimensione associativa?Dall’età liberale al fascismo, la mafia è stata considerata alla stregua di una evidenza antropologica, determinata da ambiente e contesto, se non da “atavismo”? O invece è stata considerata una manifestazione criminale, punibile in quanto tale, e nei tribunali si è…

Imbalance between genomic gain and loss identifies high-risk neuroblastoma patients with worse outcomes

2021

Survival in high-risk neuroblastoma (HR-NB) patients remains poor despite multimodal treatment. We aimed to identify HR-NB patients with worse outcomes by analyzing the genomic instability derived from segmental chromosomal aberrations. We calculated 3 genomic instability indexes for primary tumor SNP array profiles from 127 HR-NB patients: (1) Copy number aberration burden (%gainslength+%losseslength), (2) copy number load (CNL) (%gainslength-%losseslength) and (3) net genomic load (NGL) (%gainsamount-%lossesamount). Tumors were classified according to positive or negative CNL and NGL genomic subtypes. The impact of the genomic instability indexes on overall survival (OS) was assessed with…