A Case of Comorbid PTSD and Posttraumatic OCD Treated with Sertraline-Aripiprazole Augmentation.

Several studies report on traumatic history in Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and comorbidity between Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and OCD. First-line pharmacological treatments for both OCD and PTSD are primarily based on antidepressants, including Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) and Serotonin-Noradrenaline Reuptake Inhibitors (SNRI) such as Venlafaxine for PTSD. Second-Generation Antipsychotic (SGA) augmentation has shown good outcomes for nonresponsive OCD cases.

Effects of elastic stockings on peripheral and central nervous system.

Background: Prospective study to investigate the effects of elastic stockings (GCS) 23-32 mmHg at ankle on Hoffmann reflex (H-reflex) from soleus muscle under rest and after a walking program.

Methods: Fourteen subjects wore two types of GCS, at different times. Electrophysiological examinations were carried out at rest without and with GCS, immediately after walking with GCS and 20 minutes later after removing GCS.

Human Rabies - Utah, 2018.

On November 3, 2018, the Utah Department of Health (UDOH) was notified of a suspected human rabies case in a man aged 55 years. The patient's symptoms had begun 18 days earlier, and he was hospitalized for 15 days before rabies was suspected. As his symptoms worsened, he received supportive care, but he died on November 4.

Structural validity, measurement invariance, reliability and diagnostic accuracy of the Italian version of the Yale Food Addiction Scale 2.0 in patients with severe obesity and the general population.

Purpose: To examine the structural validity, measurement invariance, reliability, and some other psychometrical properties of the Italian version of the Yale Food Addiction Scale 2 (I-YFAS 2.0) in patients with severe obesity and the general population.

Methods: 704 participants-400 inpatients with severe obesity and 304 participants enrolled from the general population-completed the I-YFAS 2.

A novel tDCS sham approach based on model-driven controlled shunting.

Background: Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), a non-invasive brain stimulation technique able to transiently modulate brain activity, is surging as one of the most promising therapeutic solutions in many neurological and psychiatric disorders. However, profound limitations exist in current placebo (sham) protocols that limit single- and double-blinding, especially in non-naïve subjects.

Objective: To ensure better blinding and strengthen reliability of tDCS studies and trials, we tested a new optimization algorithm aimed at creating an "active" sham tDCS condition (ActiSham hereafter) capable of inducing the same scalp sensations perceived during real stimulation while preventing currents from reaching the cortex and cause changes in brain excitability.

The interplay among psychopathology, personal resources, context-related factors and real-life functioning in schizophrenia: stability in relationships after 4 years and differences in network structure between recovered and non-recovered patients.

Improving real-life functioning is the main goal of the most advanced integrated treatment programs in people with schizophrenia. The Italian Network for Research on Psychoses previously explored, by using network analysis, the interplay among illness-related variables, personal resources, context-related factors and real-life functioning in a large sample of patients with schizophrenia. The same research network has now completed a 4-year follow-up of the original sample.

10 anni dopo il terremoto dell'Aquila: dal trauma individuale a quello collettivo. Memorie e mnemotecnologie.

Il trauma collettivo conseguente a un disastro naturale si configura come una crisi di significato. Numerosi studi supportano la trasmissione transgenerazionale di esperienze traumatiche, come pure di modelli protettivi di resilienza. I numerosi eventi culturali e scientifici che si sono tenuti in occasione del decimo anniversario del sisma che ha colpito L'Aquila nel 2009 potrebbero essere visti nella prospettiva delle mnemotecnologie.

Attitudes of Italian Psychiatrists Toward the Evaluation of Physical Comorbidities and Sexual Dysfunction in Patients With Schizophrenia. Implications for Clinical Practice.

Treatment guidelines for patients with schizophrenia recommend evaluating their risk of physical comorbidities, especially since these patients are known to have decreased life expectancy due to comorbidities. Therefore, to the authors' knowledge, this is the first national survey conducted to investigate how Italian psychiatrists deal with the risk of physical comorbidities and sexual dysfunction in patients with schizophrenia. A sample of 750 psychiatrists completed an online survey investigating their decision making about performing blood tests, clinical and instrumental examinations, and scheduling follow-up appointments in relation to the different phases of the illness and possible pharmacological side effects.

SPG8 mutations in Italian families: clinical data and literature review.

Background: Spastic paraplegia type 8 (SPG8) is an autosomal-dominant form of hereditary spastic paraplegia (AD-HSP) caused by a mutation in the KIAA0196 gene. SPG8 accounts for 1% of less of all AD-HSP and the genotype-phenotype correlation remains poorly understood.

Methods: We report the first clinical and genetic description of SPG8 disease in Italian patients.

Case report: horse or zebra, ascites or pseudo-ascites? Care for pictural details!

Background: Pseudo-ascites is a very rare condition in children and remains a challenging diagnosis. Targeted imaging may be helpful, but a high index of clinical suspicion is often necessary to guide the investigations, as pseudo-ascites may efficiently mimic true ascites. To date, still many cases of pseudo-ascites suffer diagnostic and therapeutic delay, and some are only diagnosed during surgical exploration.

Functional and Brain Activation Changes Following Specialized Upper-Limb Exercise in Parkinson's Disease.

For the management of Parkinson's disease (PD), the concept of forced exercise (FE) has drawn interest. In PD subjects, the FE executed with lower limbs has been shown to lessen symptoms and to promote brain adaptive changes. Our study is aimed to investigate the effect of an upper-limb exercise, conceptually comparable with the FE, in PD.

Could the severity of symptoms of schizophrenia affect ability of self-appraisal of cognitive deficits in patients with schizophrenia? Lack of insight as a mediator between the two domains.

The relationship between subjective appraisal of cognitive deficits and symptom severity in schizophrenia is unclear. Insight reportedly affects both factors. Our aim is to further asses the relationship between subjective perception of cognitive deficits, symptom severity and lack of insight as a mediator variable.

Drug resistance of BRAF-mutant melanoma: Review of up-to-date mechanisms of action and promising targeted agents.

Melanoma onset and progression are associated with a high variety of activating mutations in the MAPK-pathway, most frequently involving BRAF (35-45%) and NRAS (15-25%) genes, but also c-KIT and PTEN. Targeted therapies with BRAF and MEK inhibitors showed promising results over the past years, but it is known that most responses are temporary, and almost all of patients develop a tumor relapse within one year. Different drug-resistance mechanisms underlie the progression of disease and activation of both MAPK and PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathways.

Development and factorial validity of the Psychological Skills Inventory for Sports, Youth Version - Short Form: Assessment of the psychometric properties.

Researchers in sport often try to investigate relations between athletes' psychological skills and their sports results to predict top athletic achievements or unexpectedly poor performances. The Psychology Skills Inventory for Sports (Youth version), PSIS-Y, was developed to measure psychological characteristics of young athletes-differentiating well more talented and less talented young athletes. Nevertheless, previous studies revealed its inadequate, factorial validity.

Further Exploration of Personal and Social Functioning: The Role of Interpersonal Violence, Service Engagement, and Social Network.

Social functioning (SF) has mainly been studied in major psychoses in relation to symptom severity, but other factors may interfere with the achievement of a functional remission. The aim of this study is to explore interpersonal violence (IV), service engagement (SE), and social network (SN), together with demographics, as predictors of SF in a sample of subjects with severe mental illness (SMI). Consecutive adult inpatients were evaluated using self-report and clinician-rated questionnaires.

Global phylogeography and ancient evolution of the widespread human gut virus crAssphage.

Microbiomes are vast communities of microorganisms and viruses that populate all natural ecosystems. Viruses have been considered to be the most variable component of microbiomes, as supported by virome surveys and examples of high genomic mosaicism. However, recent evidence suggests that the human gut virome is remarkably stable compared with that of other environments.

Incidence of herpes zoster and postherpetic neuralgia in Italian adults aged ≥50 years: A prospective study.

Herpes zoster (HZ) mainly affects older adults and immunocompromised individuals and is usually characterized by a unilateral painful skin rash. Its most common complication, postherpetic neuralgia (PHN), may cause chronic debilitating pain lasting for months or years. This study (ClinicalTrials.

Stimuli, presentation modality, and load-specific brain activity patterns during n-back task.

Working memory (WM) refers to a set of cognitive processes that allows for the temporary storage and manipulation of information, crucial for everyday life skills. WM deficits are present in several neurological, psychiatric, and neurodevelopmental disorders, thus making the full understanding of its neural correlates a key aspect for the implementation of cognitive training interventions. Here, we present a quantitative meta-analysis focusing on the underlying neural substrates upon which the n-back, one of the most commonly used tasks for WM assessment, is believed to rely on, as highlighted by functional magnetic resonance imaging and positron emission tomography findings.

Adjuvanted versus nonadjuvanted influenza vaccines and risk of hospitalizations for pneumonia and cerebro/cardiovascular events in the elderly.

: The higher effectiveness of MF59®-adjuvanted trivalent influenza vaccine (MF59-TIV) vs. nonadjuvanted TIV in preventing influenza-related hospitalizations was found considering few influenza seasons, local and heterogeneous settings. This study evaluated the relative vaccine effectiveness (rVE) of MF59-TIV vs.

Cross-Modal Audiovisual Modulation of Corticospinal Motor Synergies in Professional Piano Players: A TMS Study during Motor Imagery.

Transcranial magnetic stimulation was used to investigate corticospinal output changes in 10 professional piano players during motor imagery of triad chords in C major to be "mentally" performed with three fingers of the right hand (thumb, index, and little finger). Five triads were employed in the task; each composed by a stable 3rd interval (C4-E4) and a varying third note that could generate a 5th (G4), a 6th (A4), a 7th (B4), a 9th (D5), or a 10th (E5) interval. The 10th interval chord was thought to be impossible in actual execution for biomechanical reasons, as long as the thumb and the index finger remained fixed on the 3rd interval.

Source monitoring task in a sample of in-patients with verbal auditory hallucinations compared to control sample.

Patients with psychosis, especially those with specific positive symptoms such as auditory verbal hallucinations, show a source monitoring deficit, the cognitive process involved in the recognition of the information source. This defect can lead to the erroneous conclusion that self-generated thoughts are not "proper" but derive from an external source. We evaluated 37 patients diagnosed with psychotic disorder and 40 healthy controls using a modified version of the Reality Monitoring Task developed by Larøi et al.

Gamma tACS over the temporal lobe increases the occurrence of Eureka! moments.

The solution to a problem might manifest itself as a burst of unexpected, unpredictable clarity. Such Eureka! events, or Insight moments, are among the most fascinating mysteries of human cognition, whose neurophysiological substrate seems to include a role for oscillatory activity within the α and γ bands in the right parietal and temporal brain regions. We tested this hypothesis on thirty-one healthy participants using transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation (tACS) to externally amplify α (10 Hz) and γ (40 Hz) activity in the right parietal and temporal lobes, respectively.

Brief Strategic Therapy for Bulimia Nervosa and Binge Eating Disorder: A Clinical and Research Protocol.

Although cognitive behavioral therapy is the gold standard treatments for bulimia nervosa (BN) and binge eating disorder (BED), evidence for its long-term efficacy is weak. Empirical research support the efficacy of brief strategic therapy (BST) in treating BN and BED symptoms, but its statistical significance still need to be investigated. To statistically test the long-term efficacy of the BST treatment protocols for BN and BED through one-year post-treatment.

Dexamethasone Conjugation to Biodegradable Avidin-Nucleic-Acid-Nano-Assemblies Promotes Selective Liver Targeting and Improves Therapeutic Efficacy in an Autoimmune Hepatitis Murine Model.

Steroids are the standard therapy for autoimmune hepatitis (AIH) but the long-lasting administration is hampered by severe side effects. Methods to improve the tropism of the drug toward the liver are therefore required. Among them, conjugation to nanoparticles represents one possible strategy.