Publications by authors named "Villa G"

Vertical jump height from a countermovement jump is a widespread metric to assess the lower limb functionality. Motion capture systems and force platforms are considered gold standards to estimate vertical jump height; however, their use in ecological settings is limited. This study aimed to evaluate the feasibility of low-sampling-rate inertial measurement units as an alternative to the gold standard systems.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

: Respiratory tract infections (RTIs) are a leading cause of pediatric emergency department (PED) visits, especially in children under five. These infections are primarily viral, complicating diagnosis and management. This study assesses the impact of point-of-care (POC) rapid diagnostic tests for respiratory viruses on clinical and economic outcomes in a PED setting.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Glioblastomas are aggressive brain tumors that resist treatment and utilize neuron-tumor connections to promote their growth, with cholinergic neurons playing a key role in this invasion.
  • The study utilized rabies viruses for retrograde tracing to reveal how glioblastomas integrate into brain circuits, showing that radiotherapy can enhance neuron-tumor connectivity, complicating treatment efforts.
  • By disrupting neuron-tumor connections, researchers discovered a potential therapeutic approach that could halt glioblastoma progression, emphasizing the need to target these synapses for better treatment outcomes.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Continuous renal replacement therapies (CRRTs) and sequential extracorporeal blood purification (EBP) therapies can be used in patients with severe COVID-19 disease to support kidney failure and restore immune homeostasis. EBP prescription should be based on the patient's clinical needs and frequently re-evaluated during the intensive care unit (ICU) stay. Personalization of treatment at the bedside plays a fundamental role for patient recovery.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Glioblastoma is a major unmet clinical need characterized by striking inter- and intra-tumoral heterogeneity and a population of glioblastoma stem cells (GSCs), conferring aggressiveness and therapy resistance. GSCs communicate through a network of tumor-tumor connections (TTCs), including nanotubes and microtubes, promoting tumor progression. However, very little is known about the mechanisms underlying TTC formation and overall GSC morphology.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Previous research has shown that patients with ostomy frequently exhibit a low health-related quality of life (HRQoL). Self-care is a key element that influences their HRQoL. However, the evidence regarding the relationship between these two constructs in patients with ostomy is still not clear.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Glioblastoma, the most frequent primary malignant brain tumour in adults, is characterised by profound yet dynamic hypoxia and nutrient depletion. To sustain survival and proliferation, tumour cells are compelled to acquire metabolic plasticity with the induction of adaptive metabolic programs. Here, we interrogated the pathways necessary to enable processing of nutrients other than glucose.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • Patients with hypertension who engage with mobile health technologies show lower blood pressure and better understanding of their condition.
  • This study evaluated the reliability and validity of the TWEETS scale specifically for Italian patients with hypertension for the first time.
  • Results indicated that TWEETS is effective and reliable for measuring patient engagement with mHealth devices, but more research is needed across different populations to confirm its applicability.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

(1) Background: Pain is a common symptom in patients with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). There are no evidence-based pharmacological treatments for pain in ALS; recommendations are based on guidelines for chronic non-oncological pain and clinical experience. The aim is to map the literature on how people with ALS experience pain, and how this affects their daily activities and social relationships.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Urinary Incontinence (UI) has been identified as a health priority by the World Health Organization. Despite being a widely discussed topic, UI remains an underrecognized condition: affected individuals often refrain from reporting it due to its status as a socially sensitive topic and a source of embarrassment. UI exhibits a markedly higher prevalence in the female population compared to males and significantly diminishes the quality of life for those affected.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background/objective: Soccer is a multifactorial sport, requiring physical, psychological, technical, and tactical skills to succeed. Monitoring and comparing physical characteristics over time is essential to assess players' development, customize training, and prevent injury. The use of wearable sensors is essential to provide accurate and objective physical data.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: This phenomenological-hermeneutic study is about the experiences of physicians in the Oncology Intensive Care Unit of the Careggi University Hospital, in Florence. The Oncology Intensive Care Unit is a place of great emotional impact and can be create stressful situations. The emotional labor can lead to the development of cynicism, depersonalization and emotional exhaustion.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Despite the importance of social support in ostomy care, the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS) does not appear to be validated in the context of ostomy care. This study evaluated the psychometric characteristics of MSPSS in ostomy patients and their informal caregivers. The MSPSS was tested in a sample of 775 participants with confirmatory factor analysis.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Despite evidence showing that the intranasal and sublingual routes are safe and effective in providing analgesia, no data are available about their day-to-day use in the emergency department (ED). The aim of this study was to assess the frequency of the use of the intranasal and sublingual routes, and the clinical characteristics of the patients receiving analgesia through these routes.

Methods: A multicentre study was performed in the EDs participating in the Pain in Paediatric Emergency Room research group.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Central venous access devices are essential for the management of critically ill patients, but they are potentially associated with many complications, which may occur during or after insertion. Many evidence-based documents-consensus and guidelines-suggest practical recommendations for reducing catheter-related complications, but they have some limitations. Some documents are not focused on critically ill patients; other documents address only some special strategies, such as the use of ultrasound; other documents are biased by obsolete concepts, inappropriate terminology, and lack of considerations for new technologies and new methods.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF
Article Synopsis
  • - The study focused on the impact of HIV and antiretroviral therapy (ART) on kidney health in West Africans, specifically looking at people receiving ART in central Ghana from 2003 to 2018, highlighting concerns over chronic kidney disease (CKD).
  • - Researchers examined data from 659 adults, finding that the use of tenofovir disoproxil fumarate (TDF) was linked to the highest decline in kidney function, while negative hepatitis B (HBsAg) status also correlated with increased eGFR decline.
  • - Overall, the findings suggest that specific ART drugs like TDF, nevirapine, and certain protease inhibitors contribute to faster declines in kidney function among people living with
View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Peripherally inserted central catheters (PICCs) and new type of arm-port, the PICC-port, are currently used for neoadjuvant chemotherapy treatment in patients with breast cancer. We aimed to compare Quality of Life (QoL) of patients receiving one of these two devices investigating overall satisfaction, psychological impact, as well as the impact on professional, social and sport activities, and local discomfort.

Methods: We did a prospective observational before-after study of PICCs versus PICC-ports.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Postoperative patients with ostomies experience significant changes in their lives as a result of the device implantation. Self-care is important to improve their health outcomes. Telehealth provides an opportunity to expand access to self-care education.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: Widespread use of smartphone applications has opened new perspectives for home Blood Pressure monitoring based on mobile health (mHealth) technologies. Patient engagement has been dubbed 'the silver bullet of the century'.

Aim: The aim was to identify the impact of engagement in patients with blood pressure using mHealth.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Background: Postoperative acute kidney injury (PO-AKI) is a frequent complication after surgery. Various tools have been proposed to identify patients at high risk for AKI, including preoperative serum creatinine or estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR), urinary cell cycle arrest, and tubular damage biomarkers; however, none of these can appropriately assess AKI risk before surgery. Renal functional reserve (RFR) screened by the Doppler-derived intraparenchymal renal resistive index variation (IRRIV) test has been proposed to identify patients at risk for AKI before a kidney insult.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

In this issue of Cancer Cell, Zhong et al. explore the dual role of TREM2 in glioblastoma-associated myeloid cells, demonstrating its function in promoting inflammation at the tumor-neural interface and suppression within the tumor core, influenced by the local microenvironment. These findings open up promising prospects for advancements in neuro-oncological immunotherapy.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Introduction: New educational approaches are emerging to assist healthcare professionals in better personalizing patient's educational pathways. Specifically, "gamification" - the incorporation of game elements into non-game contexts - appears to be a novel and affordable approach. This scoping review aims to explore and map the literature that evaluates the efficacy of gamification in healthcare contexts.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF