[Improving Mental Health Care in People at Risk for Getting Homeless].

Overall aim was to reduce the untreated prevalence in persons with untreated mental disorders and at risk for loosing accommodation and descending into homelessness. Primary aim was treatment initiation and treatment adherence by motivational interviewing. Secondary aims were to reduce social or financial problems.

Exploratory evaluation of an obese population seeking bariatric surgery in an Italian public service.

Obesity is a difficult to treat multi-problematic disease. Bariatric surgery (BS) has been regarded as the most effective therapeutic option, however the outcomes strongly depend on baseline conditions and further behavioural modifications. Our aim was to assess the characteristics of severely obese patients seeking BS in a Public Health Service in Italy.

Preliminary evaluation of the DDS-PC inventory: a new tool to assess impulsive-compulsive behaviours associated to dopamine replacement therapy in Parkinson's disease.

Dopaminergic medications could increase the occurrence of a set of dysregulated behaviours in Parkinson's disease (PD), including reward-seeking behaviours (pathological gambling, hypersexuality, compulsive shopping, binge eating, reckless driving), punding and compulsive medication use. We report a preliminary evaluation of a questionnaire to assess the presence of these impulsive-compulsive behaviours associated to dopamine replacement therapy in PD. We screened 38 patients and their caregivers, comparing dopamine dysregulation syndrome (DDS) patients and non-DDS patients.

Treatment dropout in drug-addicted women: are eating disorders implicated?

A high prevalence of eating disorders among drug-addicted female patients has been noted, and it could be associated to psychopathological underlying factors. Our aim was to assess eating disorder traits in women approaching a residential program for drug addiction. We hypothesized that these traits would correlate to more general psychopathological factors, and would influence treatment relapse.

The thrill of reckless driving in patients with Parkinson's disease: an additional behavioural phenomenon in dopamine dysregulation syndrome?

We report two male patients with Parkinson's disease who developed compulsive risk-seeking driving behaviour as a result of self-administering high doses of L-dopa despite an adequate therapeutic response at lower doses. When L-dopa reduction was feasible, it resulted in cessation of unsafe driving. We believe that this impairment in driving performance, due to deliberate overuse of dopaminergic medication, should be included as a new behavioural phenomenon in dopamine dysregulation syndrome.

Prevalence of pathological gambling in patients with Parkinson's disease.

Pathological gambling (PG) is a psychiatric disorder characterized by loss of control of gambling, which has repercussions on family, personal, and professional life. Several recent studies have reported the relationship between PG and the treatment of Parkinson's disease (PD), but no prevalence study has yet been conducted to investigate this correlation. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of PG in Italian patients with PD on dopamine replacement therapy.

Pathological gambling in two patients on dopamine replacement therapy for Parkinson's disease.

We describe two cases where increases in dopaminergic therapy were initiated by the patients due to perceived deterioration in symptoms of idiopathic Parkinson's disease. Shortly afterwards, both cases also met clinical criteria for pathological gambling. To date, only 29 cases of pathological gambling in patients with Parkinson's disease have been reported.

Cytochemical study on human spermatozoa metabolism during in vitro capacitation.

In eutherian mammalian spermatozoa the capacitation is coupled to a specific type of metabolism, that is glycolysis or oxidative respiration. A cytochemical study was carried out on cytochrome oxidase and lactate dehydrogenase in human spermatozoa collected at different times during in vitro capacitation. Human spermatozoa were incubated in Biggers, Whitten and Wittingham's medium supplemented with 15% heat-inactivated human serum.