CENTRALIZATION AND CORRUPTION IN HEALTH PROCUREMENT OF THE SOUTHERN EUROPEAN UNION COUNTRIES.

Healthcare procurement management in public hospitals has been a major concern for the countries of the Southern Europe, both due to their perennial problems in the field of corruption and the impact of increasing migration flows on the Mediterranean routes to the European Union. This study attempts to analyze the healthcare procurement systems of the Southern EU countries (EU MED or MED-9) based on the degree of centralization and perceived corruption and examine the applied procurement policies and their results in terms of efficiency, transparency, and competition. The MED-9 group consists of Cyprus, Croatia, France, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal, Slovenia, and Spain.

Extending the concept of moral distress to parents of infants hospitalized in the NICU: a qualitative study in Greece.

Background: The hospitalization of infants in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) is an ethically challenging situation. A limited number of studies have extended the concept of moral distress to parents of infants hospitalized in the NICU. This topic requires further investigation.

Emerging Trends in Intimate Partner Rape and Marital/Spousal Rape During the Biennium 2020 and 2021, Including the COVID-19 Pandemic in Greece.

Intimate partner or marital/spousal rape is a phenomenon with unique characteristics and dynamics. Furthermore, it is an under-explored, under-defined, under-reported, and widely tolerated phenomenon. Gender-based violence and intimate partner violence are the main topics of the present study.

Understanding the Ethical Issues of Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCIs): A Blessing or the Beginning of a Dystopian Future?

In recent years, scientific discoveries in the field of neuroscience combined with developments in the field of artificial intelligence have led to the development of a range of neurotechnologies. Advances in neuroimaging systems, neurostimulators, and brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) are leading to new ways of enhancing, controlling, and "reading" the brain. In addition, although BCIs were developed and used primarily in the medical field, they are now increasingly applied in other fields (entertainment, marketing, education, defense industry).

The Greek Jefferson Scale of Empathy-Medical Student Version (JSE-S): Psychometric Properties and Its Associated Factors.

The present study aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Greek version of the Jefferson Scale of Empathy-Student version (JSE-S) and its association with potential predictors among Greek-speaking undergraduate medical students. This study adopted a cross-sectional, comparative-descriptive research design. The study was conducted during October and November 2023.

Ethical Concerns About ChatGPT in Healthcare: A Useful Tool or the Tombstone of Original and Reflective Thinking?

Artificial intelligence (AI), the uprising technology of computer science aiming to create digital systems with human behavior and intelligence, seems to have invaded almost every field of modern life. Launched in November 2022, ChatGPT (Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer) is a textual AI application capable of creating human-like responses characterized by original language and high coherence. Although AI-based language models have demonstrated impressive capabilities in healthcare, ChatGPT has received controversial annotations from the scientific and academic communities.

Perceptions and experiences of fertility preservation in female patients with cancer in Greece.

Background: As advances in oncology have led to remarkable and steady improvements in the survival rates of patients with cancer and anticancer treatment can cause premature ovarian failure in women, fertility preservation (FP) has become a global public health concern and an integral part of the care for women diagnosed with cancer during reproductive age. However, for various reasons, FP remains underutilized for patients with cancer. There are substantial gaps in our knowledge about women's experiences and perceptions of the issue.

Perceptions and experiences of female nurses when confronted with expressing a conscientious objection towards end-of-life care in Greece.

Background: Conscientious objection in nursing has been a topic of much discussion in recent years. Healthcare providers' conscientious objection has been included in Greek legislation. However, little is known about the real experiences of nurses who want to apply conscientious objections in their practice.

Ethical considerations surrounding health-related big data research.

As health-related big data research (HRBDR) has drastically increased over the last years due to the rapid development of big data analytics, a range of important ethical issues are raised. In this study, a systematic literature review was conducted. Several and interesting results emerged from this review.

Transgender Attitudes and Beliefs Scale-Greek (TABS-Gr) version: translation and initial evaluation of psychometric properties among medical students.

Background: Transgender people face significantly greater discrimination and health disparities in health care settings than cisgender people. The role of education in eliminating this phenomenon has been increasingly recognized by many medical schools. However, transgender health content is sparse or lacking in the medical curricula of many countries.

Ageism among dentists who are Facebook users in Greece.

The phenomenon of ageism in healthcare is a significant threat to elderly people's well-being. There is a literature gap regarding the topic of ageism among dental professionals in Greece. This study aims to contribute to filling this gap.

Moral distress among neonatologists working in neonatal intensive care units in Greece: a qualitative study.

Background: Working as a neonatologist in a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) is stressful and involves ethically challenging situations. These situations may cause neonatologists to experience high levels of moral distress, especially in the context of caring for extremely premature infants (EPIs). In Greece, moral distress among neonatologists working in NICUs remains understudied and warrants further exploration.

A qualitative study of nursing practitioners' experiences with COVID-19 patients dying alone in Greece.

Background: In Greece, there is still limited research on death in isolation due to COVID-19. This deserves attention because of the recent financial crisis, which profoundly impacted public health, and the high relevance of the Hippocratic tradition to the moral values of clinical practice.

Methods: A prospective qualitative study using in-depth interviews with 15 frontline nursing practitioners working in a COVID-19 ward or intensive care unit (ICU) was conducted from July 2021 to December 2021.

Epidemiology of HIV-associated peripheral neuropathy in people living with human immunodeficiency virus infection in Greece.

Background: Peripheral neuropathy is among the most common complications among people with HIV with prevalence rates varying widely among studies (10-58%).

Objective: This study aims to assess the prevalence of HIV-associated peripheral neuropathy among HIV-positive people in Northern Greece monitored during the last 5-year period and investigate possible correlations with antiretroviral therapy, disease staging, and potential risk factors, as there is no prior epidemiological record in Greek patients.

Methods: Four hundred twenty patients were divided into a group with peripheral neuropathy ( = 269), and those without ( = 151).

The phenomenon of overkill in northern Greece: A descriptive forensic psychiatric study between 2015 and 2020 on criminal offenders found not guilty by reason of insanity.

The purpose of this descriptive study was to investigate overkill in a representative sample of Greek psychiatric patients found not guilty by reason of insanity (NGRIs) from a forensic psychiatric - criminological standpoint and explore possible correlations of the phenomenon with socio-cultural or psychiatric factors. Overall, 24 forensic psychiatric records of overkill offenders were identified throughout the 5-year records of the national forensic psychiatric service in northern Greek mainland. The pattern that has emerged from the statistical results of the present study on the victims of overkill within the Greek borders was generally in line with global literature on homicide perpetrators.

Emerging trends in domestic homicide/femicide in Greece over the period 2010-2021.

Temporal trends in epidemiological parameters of domestic homicide and femicide in Greece over the last decade have not yet been studied. We conducted this study to fulfill this purpose. Specifically, we conducted a retrospective epidemiological study using 11-year data from the official nationwide Hellenic Police Archives and statistically analyzed data regarding domestic homicide and femicide.

Reliability of Greek version of the Toronto empathy questionnaire in medical students and associations with sociodemographic and lifestyle factors.

Background: Empathy is an important key driver of any therapeutic relationship. It is beneficial for both physicians and patients. Enhancing physician's empathy should be an important goal of medical education.

The medical futility experience of nursing professionals in Greece.

Background: Providing futile medical care is an ever-timely ethical problem in clinical practice. While nursing personnel are very closely involved in providing direct care to patients nearing the end of life, their role in end-of-life decision-making remains unclear.

Methods: This was a prospective qualitative study conducted with experienced nursing professionals from December 2020 through May 2021.

The ethics of health-promoting nudges.

The paper aims to provide an overview of current knowledge related to the ethicality of health-promoting nudges and a further elaboration, particularly in terms of linking the interpretation of the findings of the study and the conclusions adopted. A comprehensive narrative review of literature on the topic of interest was undertaken, aiming to contribute to the current debate on the topic of interest. It is practically hard to determine whether or not the nudgee's agency will be eroded by the particular nudge because the line of distinction between emotions or automatic ways of human reasoning and cognitive ways of human reasoning remains blurry, and the various types of nudges fall on a combination of two continuums: the one ranging from transparent to non-transparent and the other ranging from reflective to automatic.

Translation and validation of the greek version of a questionnaire measuring patient views on participation in clinical trials.

Background: The increasing number of clinical research opportunities requires increasing numbers of participants in clinical trials. However, it may become increasingly problematic, as protocols have become increasingly complex. Better understanding of patients' attitudes towards their potential participation in clinical trials is essential for developing effective clinical trial recruitment strategies.

Fertility treatment during the COVID-19 pandemic: A systematic review.

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to challenges in fertility preservation practices and has led to ethical issues, especially in developing countries. This paper provides a systematic review on this topic. At the beginning of the pandemic, several countries issued directions to suspend fertility treatments except among cancer patients.

Perceived facilitators of and barriers to mental health treatment engagement among decision-making competent adolescents in Greece.

Background: A subset of adolescents with mental disorders are likely to have decision-making capacity that facilitates their therapy engagement. However, there are high rates of drop-out in mental health settings.

Aim: This study aims to identify perceived barriers to or facilitators of mental health care engagement among adolescents with decision-making competence in Greece.

Shockwave Coronary Intravascular Lithotripsy System for Heavily Calcified De Novo Lesions and the Need for a Cost-Effectiveness Analysis.

The optimal management for severely calcified coronary artery disease is multi-adjunctive. Different strategies with dedicated devices should be available in the cardiac catheterization laboratory with their selection depending on the nature of the calcific disease and its anatomical distribution. Shockwave Intravascular Lithotripsy (S-IVL) system offers a novel option for lesion preparation of heavily calcified plaques in coronary and peripheral vessels.