Introduction
The clinical relevance of Routine Outcome Monitoring (ROM) to formulate longitudinal evaluations of treatment appropriateness/efficacy and to assist decision making aimed at improving ...the quality of person-centered interventions has been poorly implemented in forensic psychiatry, also in Italy. Indeed, very few assessment instruments have been developed in this crucial field.
Objectives
As reliable ROM instruments are lacking, the aim of the current investigation was to examine psychometric properties (i.e. reliability, concurrent validity and sensitivity to measure scores’ longitudinal changes) of the Parma Scale (Pr-Scale) (a new instrument fro the evaluation of offenders with mental disorder) in an Italian sample of forensic psychiatric patients.
Methods
Participants were male adult offenders with mental disorder recruited within the Parma REMS (“Residence for the Execution of Security Measure”) or the Parma Penitentiary Institute (PPI). Exclusion criteria were known moderate/severe intellectual disability or any other medical condition inducing inability to express a valid consent for participating in the research. The Pr-Scale includes 20 items divided into 3 main domains: “Historical”, “Clinical” (observational) and “Treatment Plannining". To test psychometric properties of the Pr-Scale, we examined interrater reliability, short-term (1-week) test-retest reliability and internal consistency. As measure of concurrent validity, a correlation analysis of Pr-Scale item scores with corresponding HKT-R (the “Historisch, Klinische en Toekomstige – Revisie” instrument) item subscores was performed. Finally, we examined the Pr-Scale sensitivity to measure scores’ longitudinal changes over a 3-month treatment follow-up period.
Results
60 male adult patients were recruited in this study. Our findings showed good to excellent interrater and test-retest reliability, concurrent validity and internal consistency for the Pr-Scale. Pr-Scale scores also display a moderate to large changeability over time (Intra-Class Correlation coefficient = 0.963, coefficient of stability = 0.997, Cronbach’s ɑ = 0.736). Statistically significant correlations of Pr-Scale item scores with the corresponding HKT-R scores were found. Across the 3-month follow-up period, we observed statistically significant sensitivity values in measuring longitudinal changes for the Pr-Scale total score and Pr-Scale domain and item subscores.
Conclusions
Our results support the clinical use of the Pr-Scale in different forensic psychiatric settings (i.e. prison, REMS) as reliable ROM instrument.
Disclosure of Interest
None Declared
Introduction
Mental health interventions for Italian (and European) prisoners with mental disorders remain a problematic issue, despite radical changes in general psychiatric care and a 2008 major ...government reform transferring mental health care in prison to the National Health Service. Indeed, according to the American Psychological Association, 64% of incarcerated individuals report mental health concerns.
Objectives
The aim of this study is to describe the mental health intervention model implemented since January 2020 for prisoners allocated in the Parma Penitentiary Institutes (PPI). This approach is specifically based on specialized, “person-centered” and “person-tailored” therapeutic-rehabilitation plans in line with psychiatric treatments usually provided in community mental health-care centers of the Parma Department of Mental Health.
Methods
All the processes and procedures included in the PPI intervention model were first carefully described, paying special attention to the service for newly admitted prisoners and each typology of specialized therapeutic-rehabilitation treatment potentially provided. Additionally, a preliminary descriptive process analysis of the first six months of clinical activity was also performed.
Results
Since January 2020, 178 individuals entered the PPI service for newly admitted prisoners. In total, 83 (46.7%) of them were engaged in the services of the PPI mental health-care team (35 with pathological addiction and 48 with mental disorders): 56 prisoners were offered an integrated mental health intervention and 27 exclusively an individual psychological or psychiatric treatment.
Conclusions
The results support the potential applicability of an integrated mental health intervention in prison, planning a person-tailored rehabilitation in close collaboration with the prisoners, their families and the local mental health/social services.
Disclosure
No significant relationships.
The real-time Railway Traffic Management Problem (rtRTMP) is the problem of detecting and solving time-overlapping conflicting requests made by multiple trains on the same track resources. This ...problem consists in retiming, reordering and rerouting trains in such a way that the propagation of disturbances in the railway network is minimized. The rtRTMP is an NP-complete problem and finding good strategies to simplify its solution process is paramount to obtain good quality results in a short computation time. Solving the Train Routing Selection Problem (TRSP) aims to reduce the size of rtRTMP instances by limiting the number of routing variables: during the pre-processing, the most promising routing alternatives among the available ones are selected for each train. Then, the selected alternatives are the only ones used for the rtRTMP. A first version of the TRSP has been recently proposed in the literature. This paper presents an improved TRSP model, where rolling stock re-utilization timing constraints and estimation of train delay propagation are taken into account. Additionally, a parallel Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) algorithm is proposed. We analyze the impact of the TRSP model and algorithm on the rtRTMP through a thorough computational campaign performed on a French case study with timetable disturbances and infrastructure disruptions. The presented model leads to a better correlation between TRSP and rtRTMP solutions, and the proposed ACO algorithm outperforms the state-of-the-art algorithm.
•We simplify the real-time railway traffic management by limiting routing decisions.•We select the most promising routing alternatives for each train in a preprocessing•Rolling stock re-utilization and delay propagation assessment enhance route choice•We solve the routing selection using a parallel Ant Colony Optimization algorithm•Experiments show our improved model and algorithm lead to better quality solutions.
Dynamic nucleation of dislocations caused by a stress front (’shock’) of amplitude $\sigma_{\rm a}$ moving with speed$V$ is investigated by solving numerically the dynamic Peierls equation with an ...efficient method. Speed $V$ andamplitude $\sigma_{\rm a}$ are considered as independent variables, with $V$ possibly exceeding the longitudinal wavespeed $c_{\rm L}$. Various reactions between dislocations take place such as scattering, dislocation-pair nucleation, annihilation, and crossing. Pairs of edge dislocation are always nucleated with speed $v \gtrsim c_{\rm L}$ (and likewise for screws with $c_{\rm L}$ replaced by $c_{\rm S}$,, the shear wavespeed). The plastic wave exhibits self-organization, forming distinct ‘bulk’ and ‘front’ zones. Nucleations occur either within the bulk or at the zone interface, depending on the value of $V$ . The front zone accumulates dislocations that are expelled from the bulk or from the interface. In eachzone, dislocation speeds and densities are measured as functions of simulation parameters. The densities exhibita scaling behavior with stress, given by $((\sigma_{\rm a} /\sigma_{\rm th} )2 − 1)^\beta$ , where $\sigma_{\rm th}$ represents the nucleation threshold and $0 < \beta < 1$.
We present results from a study of the photometric redshift performance of the Dark Energy Survey (DES), using the early data from a Science Verification period of observations in late 2012 and early ...2013 that provided science-quality images for almost 200 sq. deg. at the nominal depth of the survey. We assess the photometric redshift (photo-z) performance using about 15 000 galaxies with spectroscopic redshifts available from other surveys. These galaxies are used, in different configurations, as a calibration sample, and photo-z's are obtained and studied using most of the existing photo-z codes. A weighting method in a multidimensional colour-magnitude space is applied to the spectroscopic sample in order to evaluate the photo-z performance with sets that mimic the full DES photometric sample, which is on average significantly deeper than the calibration sample due to the limited depth of spectroscopic surveys. Empirical photo-z methods using, for instance, artificial neural networks or random forests, yield the best performance in the tests, achieving core photo-z resolutions ... ~ 0.08. Moreover, the results from most of the codes, including template-fitting methods, comfortably meet the DES requirements on photo-z performance, therefore, providing an excellent precedent for future DES data sets. (ProQuest: ... denotes formulae/symbols omitted.)
Introduction
Personal Health Budget (PHB) has been provided to consumers with severe mental illness within a policy shift toward a person-tailored mental healthcare treatment based on individual ...unmet needs. PHB is an amount of money to support patient’s health and wellbeing needs, which is planned and agreed between patients and their local NHS team. It is not new money, but it may mean spending money differently so that patients can get the care that they need. However, evidence of beneficial effects of PHB is still scarce.
Objectives
The aim of this study was to provide preliminary data on clinical and social benefits of adding PHB to a standard pharmacotherapy in patients with severe mental illness across a 24-month follow-up period.
Methods
137 individuals with severe mental illness (aged 18–50 years) were recruited in one of the adult mental health services of an Italian Department of Mental Health. They completed the Global Assessment of Functioning scale, the Health of the Nation Outcome Scale and the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale. Friedman’s test for repeated measure was used to assess the longitudinal stability of functioning and clinical parameters. A linear regression analysis was also performed.
Results
A significant decrease in all GAF scale, HoNOS and BPRS scores along the 24 months of follow-up was observed. Regression analysis results specifically showed a relevant association between a PHB multiaxial intervention and the longitudinal reduction in BPRS ‘Negative Symptoms’ and HoNOS ‘Social Problems’ subscores.
Conclusions
Our findings support the useful implementation of a PHB approach for severe mental illness patients within the Italian mental health service network.
Disclosure
No significant relationships.
Introduction
Identifying distinct dimensions of negative symptoms in First Episode Schizophrenia (FES) might result in a better understanding and treatment of this invalidating symptomatology.
...Objectives
Aim of this study was to examine negative symptom structure in FES patients using the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS).
Methods
All 147 participants, aged 12–35 years, completed the PANSS and the Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF) scale. A principal component analysis with varimax rotation was performed to investigate PANSS negative symptom structure in the FES total sample.
Results
A 2-factor model (i.e. “Expressive Deficits” and “Asociality” dimensions) was identified. Only “Expressive Deficits” domain had a significant negative correlation with baseline GAF score.
Conclusions
This bipartite solution seems to be adequate to describe the phenomenological variety of negative symptoms experienced by FES individuals at the point of entry in early intervention services.
Disclosure
No significant relationships.
Bistable vibration energy harvesters: A review Pellegrini, Sergio P; Tolou, Nima; Schenk, Mark ...
Journal of intelligent material systems and structures,
07/2013, Letnik:
24, Številka:
11
Journal Article, Conference Proceeding
Recenzirano
Powering electronics without depending on batteries is an open research field. Mechanical vibrations prove to be a reliable energy source, but low-frequency broadband vibrations cannot be harvested ...effectively using linear oscillators. This article discusses an alternative for harvesting such vibrations, with energy harvesters with two stable configurations. The challenges related to nonlinear dynamics are briefly discussed. Different existing designs of bistable energy harvesters are presented and classified, according to their feasibility for miniaturization. A general dynamic model for those designs is described. Finally, an extensive discussion on quantitative measures of evaluating the effectiveness of energy harvesters is accomplished, resulting in the proposition of a new dimensionless metric suited for a broadband analysis.
Sirtuins are NAD+ dependent deacetylases and/or ADP-ribosyl transferases active on histone and non-histone substrates. The first sirtuin was discovered as a transcriptional repressor of the ...mating-type-loci (Silent Information Regulator sir2) in the budding yeast, where it was shown to extend yeast lifespan. Seven mammalian sirtuins (SIRT1-7) have been now identified with distinct subcellular localization, enzymatic activities and substrates. These enzymes regulate cellular processes such as metabolism, cell survival, differentiation, DNA repair and they are implicated in the pathogenesis of solid tumors and leukemias. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the role of sirtuin expression, activity and inhibition in the survival of pediatric sarcoma cell lines.We have analyzed the expression of SIRT1 and SIRT2 in a series of pediatric sarcoma tumor cell lines and normal cells, and we have evaluated the activity of the sirtuin inhibitor and p53 activator tenovin-6 (Tv6) in synovial sarcoma and rhabdomyosarcoma cell lines. We show that SIRT1 is overexpressed in synovial sarcoma biopsies and cell lines in comparison with normal mesenchymal cells. Tv6 induced apoptosis as well as impaired autophagy flux. Using siRNA to knock down SIRT1 and SIRT2, we show that the expression of both proteins is crucial for the survival of rhabdomyosarcoma cells and that the loss of SIRT1 expression results in a decreased LC3II expression. Our results show that SIRT1 and SIRT2 expressions are crucial for the survival of synovial sarcomas and rhabdomyosarcomas, and demonstrate that the pharmacological inhibition of sirtuins impairs the autophagy process and induces tumor cell death.
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