75 research outputs found
Confronto fra prodotti diserbanti su broccoletto di rapa o cima di rapa (Brassica campestris L.) coltivato in successione al frumento.
No full textProfili critici e istanze di revisione del diritto di iniziativa dei cittadini europei
No full textThe article examines the critical issues raised by the implementation of Regulation (EU) No 211/2011 on the European Citizen's Initiative (ECI) and the viables proposed to make sure that the present ECI Regulation works as well as possible and to provide an input for its revision. After some preliminary remarks about the present procedures and the conditions required for a citizen''s initiative according to the General Court's interpretation, the analisys is carried out having regard to the documents of the Union's institutions and bodies on this subject. Thus, the analysis shows so far that the critical issues were detected in all the procedural steps of the ECI. The author concludes that, pending the review of Regulation, the framework in force lends itself to allowing for the adoption of measures to overcome some of the problems found, concerning relevants aspects of the procedure. .L'articolo considera le criticità rivelate dall'applicazione del regolamento (UE) n. 211/2011 sul diritto di iniziativa dei cittadine europei )ICE) e le soluzioni prospettate al fine di assicurare il miglior funzionamento possibile della disciplina vigente e fornire elementi utili per la revisione di essa. Premessa una ricognizione di tale disciplina alla luce della giurisprudenza del Tribunale, l'analisi è condotta tenendo conto dei documenti adottati in proposito dagli organi e dalle istituzioni dell'UE. L'analisi denota che i profili problematici emersi nell'applicazione del regolamento riguardano tutte le fasi della procedura dell'ICE. La conclusione è nel senso che, in attesa di una formale revisione del regolamento, la normativa vigente consente di adottare misure idonee a risolvere talune delle criticità riscontrate per l'esercizio dell'ICE relative ad aspetti rilevanti della procedura
Development of a Flight Management System Within the UAV - SCAUT Project
No full textThe Department of Aerospace Engineering of the University of Pisa is developing a research project, referred to as SCAUT Project, regarding the possibilities of employing UAVs of the MALE category for civil applications. After a brief introduction of the principal guidelines of the project, in this paper we describe the activities developed so far and introduce those currently in progress. The latter essentially concern the study of the problems related to the debugging phase of a Flight Management System (FMS) able to manage the UAV flight. The main functions required by the FMS are introduced and a discussion is made concerning the results obtained for the debugging functions of autopilot, navigation, and mission planning. The FMS software is implemented on a PC 104 computer. This software will be experimented in flight on a model in scale 1⁄2 of the UAV-SCAUT
Risk of False Acetylcholine Receptor Autoantibody Positivity by Radioimmunoprecipitation Assay in Clinical Practice
No full textBackground and Objectives Radioimmunoprecipitation assay (RIPA) is the gold standard for acetylcholine receptor (AChR)–immunoglobulin G (IgG) detection in patients with myasthenia gravis (MG), with a reported specificity of ≈99%. The risk of “false” AChR-IgG positivity in clinical practice is often considered negligible, although data on large, real-life populations are scarce. The objective of this study was to determine the positive predictive value (PPV) and risk of false AChR-IgG positivity with RIPA in a large cohort of patients with suspected MG. Methods We retrospectively identified patients consecutively tested for AChR-IgG by RIPA at the University-Hospital of Sassari over 20 years (2003–2022) (n = 4,795). Medical records of AChR-IgG–positive patients (titer ≥0.5 nmol/L) were reviewed by 2 investigators to identify nonmyasthenic cases with false antibody positivity, defined as follows: (1) clinical phenotypes not consistent with MG and/or (2) symptoms better explained by alternative diagnoses. The characteristics of myasthenic and nonmyasthenic patients with AChR-IgG positivity were compared. A sample of nonmyasthenic patients was retested by fixed cell-based assay (CBA). Results Among 445 of 4,795 patients testing positive for AChR-IgG during the study period, 83 were excluded (insufficient information). Of 362 AChR-IgG–positive patients included, 50 (13.8%) were designated as nonmyasthenic. The PPV and specificity were 86.2% (95% CI 82.2–89.6) and 98.9% (95% CI 98.5–99.2), respectively. Alternative diagnoses in nonmyasthenic patients included ophthalmologic diseases (n = 8), rheumatic diseases (n = 7), pseudoptosis (n = 5), myopathy (n = 4), functional disorders (n = 3), cranial nerve palsy (n = 2), parkinsonism (n = 2), demyelinating diseases (n = 2), and others (n = 17). Compared with patients with MG, nonmyasthenic patients were younger (median age 65 [range 7–91] vs 38 [range 5–80] years), more frequently female (155/312 [49.8%] vs 37/50 [74%]), had lower AChR-IgG titers (median 6 [range 0.5–28] vs 0.7 [range 0.5–5.5] nmol/L), and were more likely to become seronegative on subsequent tests (9/120 [8%] vs 6/11 [55%]). After stratification by titer ≥1 nmol/L, the PPV increased to 96.6% (95% CI 94–98.3). Serum of 7 nonmyasthenic patients was retested by CBA, giving negative results (n = 6) or selective positivity against the fetal AChR isoform (n = 1). Discussion False AChR-IgG positivity may occur in clinical practice with RIPA and associates with low antibody titer. Caution is needed when titers between 0.5 and 0.9 nmol/L are detected in low-probability situations because failure to recognize false antibody positivity may lead to misdiagnosis and inappropriate treatments
Combining three different souces of as a valid tool to identify known diabetic patients: use in a prevalence study in an Italian Local Health Unit
No full textThis study was carried out to validate the prevalence of known diabetes estimated from three different simultaneous sources (medical records from out-patient departments, registers and pharmaceutical prescriptions) as against the diagnosis of family doctors who had received ad hoc training before the study. To this effect, a selected Local Health Unit (Unità Sanitaria Locale or USL) in Bari, southern Italy, was examined. 2917 diabetic patients were found, with a 2.82% prevalence. The prevalence of known diabetes estimated from separate sources was 1.41% from medical records, 1.52% from the registers and 1.59% from prescriptions. With reference to the family doctor's conclusions, sensitivity, positive predictive value and efficiency of medical records were 49.8%, 92.5% and 57.4% of USL registers 53.8%, 95.6% and 61.8% of prescriptions 56.3%, 71.2% and 47.9%. 46% of the diabetic subjects were only identified from one source. In conclusion, by combining several sources of information together, a higher number of diabetic patients are identified than would be done by using separate sources; also, active cooperation from the family practitioners seems to be needed to correct the large number of false positive patients (n = 798) mostly identified from prescriptions
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