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Purpose of review: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a high prevalence condition with a significant clinical and economic burden. In elderly people, COPD is often associated with other chronic comorbidities (i.e. cardiovascular diseases), determining clinical complications and requiring frequent acute healthcare interventions. The aim of this article is to review the economic studies

Background: The "Valentino" cross-sectional study is aimed at evaluating the prevalence and pattern of cigarette smoking according to occupational group in a representative sample of workers aged 18-35 years from Abruzzo, Italy. Methods: Randomly selected workers anonymously self-compiled a structured questionnaire containing validated items. Job type was coded according to the International Stand

Currently, more than one instrument has been found to be reliable and valid for the assessment of hospital admission appropriateness. However; data on the level of agreement among these methodologies are extremely scarce. The study was aimed at evaluating whether the percentages of organizational (in)appropriateness resulting from some of the most diffused instruments (Italian Appropriateness Eval

Objectives: Seasonal influenza represents a major threat to public health but vaccination campaigns are strongly recommended to reduce the risks of serious complications and mortality among community-dwelling elderly persons. We investigated on potential social predictors of influenza vaccination among older adults in Italy. Methods: Data analysis was based on the national survey "Health and use o

Background: Flu vaccination significantly reduces the risk of serious complications like hospitalization and death among community-dwelling older people, therefore vaccination programmes targeting this population group represent a common policy in developed Countries. Among the determinants of vaccine uptake in older age, a growing literature suggests that social relations can play a major role. M

Assistive Technologies offer the possibility to develop services aimed at improving the Quality of Life of patients and caregivers. Specifically, this work refers to the case of persons with dementia who can live in their homes but need to be assisted. This paper describes a monitoring kit that provides alarms to the caregiver in case of dangerous situations or unusual events detected by the senso

Purpose: The pelvic incidence (PI) is used to describe the sagittal spino-pelvic alignment. In previous studies, radiographs were used, leading to less accuracy in establishing the three-dimensional (3D) spino-pelvic parameters. The purpose of this study is to analyze the differences in the 3D sagittal spino-pelvic alignment in adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS) subjects and non-scoliotic contr

This paper examines the sources of knowledge workers’ work intensity and the self-leading strategies they apply to deal with it. The paper is based on focus group interviews with management consultants in a Danish management consultancy firm. Work intensity was identified as resulting from a combination of: (1) a results-only focus, (2) vagueness, (3) boundaryless work, and (4) low control of the

Animal flight represents a great challenge and model for biomimetic design efforts. Powered flight at low speeds requires not only appropriate lifting surfaces (wings) and actuator (engine), but also an advanced sensory control system to allow maneuvering in confined spaces, and take-off and landing. Millions of years of evolutionary tinkering has resulted in modern birds and bats, which are achie

In this work, we propose a novel method for quantifying distances between Toeplitz structured covariance matrices. By exploiting the spectral representation of Toeplitz matrices, the proposed distance measure is defined based on an optimal mass transport problem in the spectral domain. This may then be interpreted in the covariance domain, suggesting a natural way of interpolating and extrapolatin

Purpose: The task-based assessment of image quality using model observers is increasingly used for the assessment of different imaging modalities. However, the performance computation of model observers needs standardization as well as a well-established trust in its implementation methodology and uncertainty estimation. The purpose of this work was to determine the degree of equivalence of the ch

In this work, we propose new methods for information fusion and tracking in direction of arrival (DOA) estimation by utilizing an optimal mass transport framework. Sensor array measurements in DOA estimation may not be consistent due to misalignments and calibration errors. By using optimal mass transport as a notion of distance for combining the information obtained from all the sensor arrays, we

Cells and organelles are small units for biochemical synthetic purposes, often the smallest practically feasible unit since they contain coenzyme regenerating system, ordered enzyme sequences, etc.These volumes, besides giving some insight into basic technology (immobilisation procedures, etc.), also sum up the current know-how in this subject area and try to predict some future trends. The term i

The R+-F+-Consistency problem takes as input two sets R+ and R- of resolved triplets and two sets F+ and F- of fan triplets, and asks for a distinctly leaf-labeled tree that contains all elements in R+ ⊂ F+ and no elements in R- ⊂ F- as embedded subtrees, if such a tree exists. This article presents a detailed characterization of how the computational complexity of the problem changes under variou

We report on an experimental demonstration of spatially-resolved detection of atomic hydrogen in flames using a single-ended configuration yielding 656-nm lasing in the backward direction upon 2-photon pumping with 205-nm femtosecond laser pulses. Spatial resolution is achieved by temporally-resolved detection of the backward lasing using a streak camera. The method is demonstrated in CH4/O2 flame

In this work, we propose a novel method for interpolation and extrapolation of Toeplitz structured covariance matrices. By considering a spectral representation of Toeplitz matrices, we use an optimal mass transport problem in the spectral domain in order to define a notion of distance between such matrices. The obtained optimal transport plan naturally induces a way of interpolating, as well as e

Tumor hypoxia is associated with several features of aggressive glioma growth, including migration, invasion, and stemness. Most of the cellular adaptation to hypoxia is mediated by the hypoxia-inducible factors HIF-1α and HIF-2α, but regulation of these factors by both oxygen-dependent and –independent mechanisms in brain tumors is only partially understood. Here, we show that the p75 neurotrophi