Search Results (9)

In recent years, we assisted the exploitation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) that invasively pervades in several instances of everyday life. The potential of this technology promises the automation of human tasks increasing accuracy and efficiency. The integration of AI systems in the orthopaedic field is becoming more and more a concrete reality, so this topic is gaining increasing interest by the scientific community. More and more authors are testing the power of AI in orthopaedics, exploiting the application in routine workflow, and asking if AI could improve clinical and surgical practice. In this brief narrative review, the state-of-art of AI in hip district orthopaedics is presented, particularly focusing on the application of AI tools in the context of radiological images, early diagnosis, clinical datasets, and around operative theatre. Possible future development of AI-hip pathology management is exposed too, and clear doubts about exploits of these tools in clinical practice are also exposed. Full article

The importance of lipid molecules present at the level of cell membranes is already well known. They can act as secondary messengers, participating in signal transduction processes that regulate various organ functions; furthermore, their nature significantly influences cellular properties and functions. Recent studies have seen how the lipid composition of cell membranes is connected to the animal lifespan and the onset of several pathological conditions. While numerous studies have been conducted aimed at characterizing the membrane lipidomic profile in the human field, in the animal field, especially in pets, the number of studies is very limited. In recent years, preliminary analyses have been conducted to provide initial information on the composition of membrane fatty acids in healthy pets and those with chronic enteropathy. The results of these studies are very interesting as they highlight differences in fatty acid composition between the two groups of animals. Obviously, a greater number of works is needed to obtain more reliable results and to analyze how the membrane lipid composition can vary in different breeds and sizes of dogs and cats in an attempt to understand the mechanisms underlying it. The present review is divided into three main parts: the first one examines the close influence of fatty acids on membrane properties/functions, the second one presents the main lipidomic analyses conducted so far on companion animals, and the third and final part summarizes the latest works on the link between membrane lipid profiles and animal lifespans, also focusing on dietary and non-dietary strategies able to influence it. Membrane lipidomics allows us to obtain a concrete overview of an animal’s metabolism and nutrition; furthermore, lipid alterations could be used as biomarkers for the early diagnosis of pathologies. This represents an innovative tool in the veterinary field to monitor the metabolic/health status of animals. Full article

Many tools of clinical medicine, such as clinical chemistry and diagnostic imaging, are prioritized for clinical diagnosis over post mortem diagnosis. Indeed, it is reasonable that the assessment of a patient’s functional status should take priority over the post mortem, cross-sectional use of diagnostic tests and laboratory equipment. In addition, these tools are sometimes expensive, and their use does not always have a reasonable cost–benefit ratio. However, some post mortem observations, such as inflammation, pulmonary edema, or infiltration and cerebral swelling, cannot be explained without using immunohistochemical markers for post mortem diagnosis. Introducing blood-based biomarkers into post mortem care could significantly reduce the rates of inconclusive post mortems and discrepancies in autopsy findings and clinical diagnoses. This is particularly relevant in relation to vascular pathology, considering the significant burden that vascular diseases represent for overall mortality. Expanding traditional autopsies with blood-based (circulating) biomarkers to avoid invasive post mortem examination would have cultural, religious, and potentially economic advantages. All of the target molecules were discussed in the context of the processes they up-regulate or down-regulate, which turned out to be the final cause of death. Ultimately, it is evident that further studies are needed to provide concrete validation for using a combination of markers for each case to reach a post mortem diagnosis with or without clinical records. Full article

Cervical cancer is one of the most common cancers that threaten women’s lives, and its early screening is of great significance for the prevention and treatment of cervical diseases. Pathologically, the accurate segmentation of cervical cells plays a crucial role in the diagnosis of cervical cancer. However, the frequent presence of adherent or overlapping cervical cells in Pap smear images makes separating them individually a difficult task. Currently, there are few studies on the segmentation of adherent cervical cells, and the existing methods commonly suffer from low segmentation accuracy and complex design processes. To address the above problems, we propose a novel star-convex polygon-based convolutional neural network with an encoder-decoder structure, called SPCNet. The model accomplishes the segmentation of adherent cells relying on three steps: automatic feature extraction, star-convex polygon detection, and non-maximal suppression (NMS). Concretely, a new residual-based attentional embedding (RAE) block is suggested for image feature extraction. It fuses the deep features from the attention-based convolutional layers with the shallow features from the original image through the residual connection, enhancing the network’s ability to extract the abundant image features. And then, a polygon-based adaptive NMS (PA-NMS) algorithm is adopted to screen the generated polygon proposals and further achieve the accurate detection of adherent cells, thus allowing the network to completely segment the cell instances in Pap smear images. Finally, the effectiveness of our method is evaluated on three independent datasets. Extensive experimental results demonstrate that the method obtains superior segmentation performance compared to other well-established algorithms. Full article

Introduction: Early and accurate Alzheimer’s disease (AD) diagnosis has evolved in recent years by the use of specific methods for detecting its histopathological features in concrete cases. Currently, biomarkers in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and imaging techniques (amyloid PET) are the most used specific methods. However, some results between both methods are discrepant. Therefore, an evaluation of these discrepant cases is required. Objective: The aim of this work is to analyze the characteristics of cases showing discrepancies between methods for detecting amyloid pathology. Methodology: Patients from the Neurology Department of La Fe Hospital (n = 82) were diagnosed using both methods (CSF biomarkers and amyloid-PET). Statistical analyses were performed using logistic regression, and sex and age were included as covariables. Additionally, results of standard neuropsychological evaluations were taken into account in our analyses. Results: The comparison between CSF biomarker (Aβ42) and amyloid PET results showed that around 18% of cases were discrepant—mainly CFS-negative and PET-positive cases had CSF levels close to the cut-off point. In addition, a correlation between the episodic memory test and CSF biomarkers levels was observed. However, the same results were not obtained for other neuropsychological domains. In general, CSF- and PET-discrepant cases showed altered episodic memory in around 66% of cases, while 33% showed normal performance. Conclusions: In common clinical practice at tertiary memory centers, result discrepancies between tests of amyloid status are far more common than expected. However, episodic memory tests remain an important support method for AD diagnosis, especially in cases with discrepant results between amyloid PET and CSF biomarkers. Full article

The use of bone biopsy for histomorphometric analysis is a quantitative histological examination aimed at obtaining quantitative information on bone remodeling, structure and microarchitecture. The labeling with tetracycline before the procedure also allows for a dynamic analysis of the osteoblastic activity and mineralization process. In the nephrological setting, bone biopsy is indicated to confirm the diagnosis of subclinical or focal osteomalacia and to characterize the different forms of renal osteodystrophy (ROD). Even if bone biopsy is the gold standard for the diagnosis and specific classification of ROD, the use of this approach is very limited. The main reasons for this are the lack of widespread expertise in performing or interpreting bone biopsy results and the cost, invasiveness and potential pain associated with the procedure. In this regard, the sedation, in addition to local anesthesia routinely applied in Italian protocol, significantly reduces pain and ameliorates the pain perception of patients. Concerning the lack of widespread expertise, in Italy a Hub/Spokes model is proposed to standardize the analyses, optimizing the approach to CKD patients and reducing the costs of the procedure. In addition, new tools offer the possibility to evaluate the osteogenic potential or the ability to form bone under normal and pathological conditions, analyzing mesenchymal stem cells and their ability to differentiate in the osteogenic lineage. In the same way, circulating microRNAs are suggested as a tool for exploring osteogenic potential. The combination of different diagnostic approaches and the optimization of the bioptic procedure represent a concrete solution to spread the use of bone biopsy and optimize CKD patient management. Full article

Early deterioration of reinforced concrete foundations has been often reported in recent years. This process is usually characterized by an extensive mapping cracking process on concrete surfaces that results from several types of Internal Swelling Reaction (ISR). In this paper, a real case study of a tall reinforced concrete building with a severe deterioration process installed in its deep foundations is discussed. Laboratory tests were performed in concrete drilled cores extracted from a deep pile cap block 19 years after the beginning of construction. Tests to assess the compressive strength, the static and the dynamic modulus of elasticity, the gas permeability, and electron microscopy scanning to find out the primary mechanism responsible for the deterioration observed during in situ inspections. Chemical alterations of materials were observed in concrete cores, mainly due to Delayed Ettringite Formation (DEF), which significantly affected the integrity and durability of the structure. Dynamic modulus of elasticity showed to be a better indicator of damage induced by ISR in concrete than compressive strength. Procedures to strengthen the deteriorated elements using prestressing proved to be an efficient strategy to recover the structural integrity of pile caps deteriorated due to expansions due to ISR. Full article

Coccidiosis is still one of the major parasitic infections in poultry. It is caused by protozoa of the genus Eimeria, which cause concrete economic losses due to malabsorption, bad feed conversion rate, reduced weight gain, and increased mortality. The greatest damage is registered in commercial poultry farms because birds are reared together in large numbers and high densities. Unfortunately, these enteric pathologies are not preventable, and their diagnosis is only available when the disease is full-blown. For these reasons, the preventive use of anticoccidials—some of these with antimicrobial action—is a common practice in intensive farming, and this type of management leads to the release of drugs in the environment which contributes to the phenomenon of antibiotic resistance. Due to the high relevance of this issue, the early detection of any health problem is of great importance to improve animal welfare in intensive farming. Three prototypes, previously calibrated and adjusted, were developed and tested in three different experimental poultry farms in order to evaluate whether the system was able to identify the coccidia infection in intensive poultry farms early. For this purpose, a data-driven machine learning algorithm was built, and specific critical values of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) were found to be associated with abnormal levels of oocystis count at an early stage of the disease. This result supports the feasibility of building an automatic data-driven machine learning algorithm for an early warning of coccidiosis. Full article

This manuscript covers the history of Cardiovascular Pathology and the tradition of the study of the cardiovascular system since the Renaissance time, when the University of Padua was the Gymnasium of the Republic of Venice. The anatomy of the heart was described by Andreas Vesalius in 1543. Realdo Colombo published the discovery of the small circulation in 1559 by dissecting dogs in vivo. Fabrici ab Aquapendente built a permanent Anatomical Theatre in 1594, which may be considered the first Laboratory of investigation in the History of Medicine. William Harvey studied in Padua in 1599–1602 and, inspired by the venous valves dissected by Fabrici, put forward the theory of blood circulation. In the same period (1592–1610), Galileo Galilei was professor of Maths at the School of Medicine in Padua and founded the experimental method, according to which science is measure. Giovanni Battista Morgagni, by publishing the book De Sedibus et Causis Morborum per Anatomen Indagatis in 1761, introduced the method of clinico-pathologic correlations and established pathological anatomy as a science. The policy of the Venice Republic was to provide smart lecturers: only men of demonstrated excellence were given the charge over the education of the young. Major advances have been made in the current era with the advent of cardiac surgery, interventional cardiology and cardiac imaging. The mission of the pathologist moved from the anatomical to the surgical theatre and more recently to the molecular laboratory. Dissemination of knowledge of surgical and clinical anatomy of congenital heart diseases contributed to a sharp decline in operative mortality. Surgical pathology, with the use of light and electron microscopy, became a daily job to examine any native tissue resected at surgery from heart and vessels and even endovascular prostheses. Cardiac transplantation and endomyocardial biopsy resulted in a novel development of cardiovascular pathology history. The sudden death mystery was cleared up with concrete, preventive results. Application of molecular biology and genetic techniques makes it possible to nowadays gain a precise diagnosis even at mortem (“molecular autopsy”), with the opportunity to investigate the etiopathogenesis, in addition to the substrate of cardiovascular diseases. The position of the cardiovascular pathologist, between the bench and the bedside, allows him to play a key role in the study of cardiovascular disease. Full article