Psychometric Properties of the Greek Version of the Medical Office on Patient Safety Culture in Primary Care Settings.

Background: Safety culture is considered one of the most crucial premises for further development of patient care in healthcare. During the eight-year economic crisis (2010-2018), Greece made significant reforms in the way the primary health care system operates, aiming at the more efficient operation of the system without degrading issues of safety and quality of the provided health services. In this context, this study aims to validate a specialized tool-the Medical Office Survey on Patient Safety Culture (MOSPSC)-developed by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) to evaluate primary care settings in terms of safety culture and quality.

Denosumab effects on serum levels of the bone morphogenetic proteins antagonist noggin in patients with transfusion-dependent thalassemia and osteoporosis.

Introduction: Noggin is an antagonist of bone morphogenetic proteins (BMPs) and has a strong effect on osteogenesis. Osteoporosis is a common complication of transfusion dependent beta-thalassemia (TDT) and denosumab has been recently emerged as a promising therapeutic option. This was a post hoc investigation of serum noggin levels among TDT patients with osteoporosis who participated in a randomized, placebo-control, phase 2b study.

Denosumab in transfusion-dependent thalassemia osteoporosis: a randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind phase 2b clinical trial.

Denosumab (DNM) is a fully human monoclonal antibody against the receptor activator of nuclear factor kappa-B ligand (RANKL) that has been licensed for the treatment of different types of osteoporosis. However, the prospective data for the evaluation of DNM efficacy on transfusion-dependent thalassemia (TDT)-induced osteoporosis are rather limited. Thus, we conducted a randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind, phase 2b clinical trial to evaluate DNM in TDT osteoporosis.

EEG coherence in a mental arithmetic task performance in first episode schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder.

Objectives: To evaluate the coherence values of the cortical bands in patients with first episode schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder during the performance of a mental arithmetic task.

Method: We analysed EEG coherence in the resting state and subsequently while counting down from 200 in steps of 7 in 32 first episode schizophrenia patients (SZ), 32 patients with first episode schizoaffective disorder (SA) and 40 healthy controls (HC).

Results: Task performance in HC is characterised by decreased coherence in the alpha bands and increased coherence in the beta 2 and gamma bands in frontal sites.