1,720,961 research outputs found
Impact of COVID-19 mitigation measures on patients with spine disease in Friuli Venezia Giulia
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Computerized Three-Dimensional Analysis: A Novel Method to Assess the Effect of Open-Door Laminoplasty
No full textIntroduction: The three-dimensional elaboration of morphological data derived from computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans generates virtual anatomical reconstructions. Here, we propose a novel protocol to analyze the postoperative results of open-door laminoplasty to evaluate differences in the volume of the spinal canal. The protocol uses geometric models in patients with cervical degenerative myelopathy before versus after cervical laminoplasty. Materials and methods: Mimics and 3-Matic software (Materialise, Leuven, BE) programs were used to segment anatomical structures and create polygon meshes of spines. Patients with cervical spondylotic myelopathy were enrolled. The models obtained before and after laminoplasty were superimposed by using a global registration function. The magnitude of divergence was quantified by using the root-mean-square error (RMSE). Results: Using this novel protocol, we were able to map the differences in the volume of the spinal canal before laminoplasty and after laminoplasty and to quantify its magnitude and calculate the volumes. Discussion and conclusions: The development of a procedure to measure the space within the cervical bone walls using geometric parameters represents a new, powerful method to verify the results obtained by cervical laminoplasty. Further research horizons may include the routine use of virtual models in surgical planning for this procedure
Spine surgery in Italy in the COVID-19 era: Proposal for assessing and responding to the regional state of emergency
No full textIn December 2019, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) was discovered in Wuhan, Hubei province, from where it spread rapidly across the globe. COVID-19 characteristics – elevated infectivity, rapid spread, and general population susceptibility – pose a great challenge to hospitals. Infectious disease, pulmonology, and intensive care units have been strengthened and expanded. All other specialties have been compelled to suspend or reduce clinical and elective surgical activities. The profound effects on spine surgery call for systematic approaches to optimizing the diagnosis and treatment of spinal diseases. Here, based on the experience of one Italian region, we draw an archetype for assessing the current and predicted level of stress in the health care system, with the aim of enabling hospitals to make better decisions during the pandemic. Further, we provide a framework that may help guide strategies for adapting surgical spine care to the conditions of epidemic surge
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Limits and usefulness of intraoperative evoked potentials during laminoplasty
No full textBACKGROUND: Over the past 10 years, intraoperative neurophysiological monitoring (IONM) has been widely performed during surgery for treating spondylotic cervical myelopathy. Our study considers the predictive value of IONM during laminoplasty, regarding, first, the adequacy of spinal cord decompression and, second, the long-term neuro-functional outcome. METHODS: We considered 38 patients with the diagnosis of degenerative cervical myelopathy who underwent an open-door laminoplasty. All patients were evaluated preoperatively, and at three and 12 months postoperatively, with the Japanese Orthopedic Association (JOA) point scale. Upper and lower limb somatosensory and motor evoked potentials (SSEPs and MEPs) were recorded preoperatively and intraoperatively. RESULTS: During surgery, three of 38 patients showed a deterioration of SSEPs and MEPs compared to baseline values. Surgery was then converted from laminoplasty to laminectomy, resulting in the gradual restoration of the evoked potentials. The neurophysiological parameter significantly associated with a better clinical outcome was the latency of lower limbs MEPs. The 12 patients who had a more prominent reduction of the MEPs latency at the end of surgery showed a higher post-surgical JOA score, increasing ≥30% compared to baseline values at the 3- and 12-month follow-up. CONCLUSIONS: Though not a predictor of clinical outcome, the IONM was essential to evaluate the effectiveness of spinal cord decompression. Reduced latency of lower limbs MEPs may predict a better clinical outcome. We suggest that IONM in patients with degenerative cervical myelopathy should be routine. It is necessary to conduct larger studies to clarify the predictive value of IONM
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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