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Introduzione. Nell’ambito del Piano Oncologico Nazionale 2023-2027 sull’importanza della formazione virtuale, multidisciplinare e interattiva, l’Intergruppo Melanoma Italiano (IMI) ha sviluppato MelaMEd (Melanoma Multimedia Education), un progetto nazionale per i medici di medicina generale (MMG) sulla prevenzione e diagnosi del melanoma cutaneo, basato su una piattaforma WEB e un corso online. MelaMEd consente ai partecipanti di (1) riconoscere lesioni cutanee che richiedono una valutazione dermatologica specialistica, (2) selezionare pazienti ad alto rischio di melanoma e (3) essere informati sul percorso diagnostico e terapeutico dei pazienti affetti da melanoma. Obiettivi. Il progetto ha l’obiettivo di dimostrare l’efficacia di MelaMEd nel migliorare l’abilità dei MMG nel riconoscere e gestire il melanoma. Inoltre, lo studio vuole identificare aree di miglioramento in cui intervenire per migliorare l’accuratezza diagnostica. Metodi. A giugno 2022, sono stati sviluppati e lanciati una piattaforma ed un corso online gratuiti. Prima di iniziare il corso, i partecipanti hanno compilato un questionario pre-formazione riguardante le conoscenze di base della malattia e il riconoscimento e la gestione delle lesioni sospette. Dopo il corso, i partecipanti hanno compilato nuovamente lo stesso questionario. Il corso è terminato a dicembre 2023. Presentiamo un'analisi descrittiva intermedia dei risultati (gennaio 2023-luglio 2023) ed un dato grezzo sulla adesione al completo percorso formativo, che consiste nel completamento di tutte e tre le fasi. Risultati. Al 31 luglio, avevano partecipato al progetto 5 centri per un totale di 1320 partecipanti. Di questi, 302 avevano compilato il questionario pre-formazione. Il 47% di loro aveva un'età <40 anni. Gli intervistati erano equamente divisi tra medici di base (47%) e medici in formazione (48%). Tra le domande teoriche, sono risultate ben note le regole dell’“ABCDE” e del “brutto anatroccolo” (rispettivamente 96% e 91% d

Background Data on the epidemiological impact and clinical characteristics of chronic hand eczema in Southern Europe are lacking. Objectives To estimate the prevalence of chronic hand eczema in its different stages of severity and refractoriness to standard therapy in patients accessing Italian dermatological reference centres, and to evaluate sociodemographic and clinical factors associated with each stage. Methods A cross-sectional multicentre study was conducted. Adult patients with hand eczema, consecutively accessing 14 centres over a 6-month period, were enrolled. Patients were classified according to disease duration, severity and response to standard therapy with potent topical corticosteroids. Logistical regression was performed to investigate the relationship between sociodemographic and clinical data with different stages of eczema. Results The total number of participants was 981. Hand eczema was chronic in 83·5% of patients; 21·3% had severe eczema, with 62·0% of these patients refractory to standard therapy. Food processing and related work, the health professions, craft and related trade works (building, plumbing, electrical), hairdressing/beauty and handicraft work were most frequently associated with chronic hand eczema. Severe chronic hand eczema was more likely to be seen in men, older patients and those with less education. Severe and refractory hand eczema was also more likely among the unemployed and patients with allergic rhinitis and/or atopic dermatitis. Conclusions Chronic hand eczema is frequent among patients with hand eczema accessing dermatology centres. Many patients were severe and refractory to standard therapy. The appropriate identification of hand eczema is the first step in implementing effective and efficient treatments.

Digital imaging devices have gained an important role in everyone's life, due to a continuously decreasing price, and of the growing interest on photo sharing through social networks. As a result of the above facts, everyone continuously leaves visual "traces" of his/her presence and life on the Internet, that can constitute precious data for forensic investigators. Digital Image Forensics is the task of analysing such digital images for collecting evidences. In this field, the recent introduction of techniques able to extract a unique "fingerprint" of the source camera of a picture, e.g. based on the Sensor Pattern Noise (SPN), has set the way for a series of useful tools for the forensic investigator. In this paper, we propose a novel usage of SPN, to find social network accounts belonging to a certain person of interest, who has shot a given photo. This task, that we name Picture-to-Identity linking, can be useful in a variety of forensic cases, e.g., finding stolen camera devices, cyber-bullying, or on-line child abuse. We experimentally test a method for Picture-to-Identity linking on a benchmark data set of publicly accessible social network accounts collected from the Internet. We report promising result, which show that such technique has a practical value for forensic practitioners., QC 20150611

Accuracy in melanoma detection is important to recognize early curable melanomas and to minimize the unnecessary excision of benign lesions. The aim of this paper was to evaluate melanoma screening accuracy of Italian pigmented lesion clinics in terms of number needed to excise (NNE), melanoma thickness, and number of melanomas diagnosed during patient follow-up.

The widespread diffusion of digital imaging devices fuelled a growing interest on photo sharing through social networks. Nowadays, Internet users continuously leave visual "traces" of their presence and life on the Internet, which can constitute precious data for forensic investigators. Digital Image Forensics tools are used to analyse such images and collect evidences. One of such tools is the Sensor Pattern Noise (SPN), that is, an unique "fingerprint" left on a picture by the source camera sensor. In this paper, we propose and experimentally test a novel usage of SPN, to find social network accounts belonging to a person of interest, who has shot a given photo. We name this task Picture-to-Identity linking, and believe it can be useful in a variety of forensic cases, e.g., finding stolen camera devices, cyber-bullying, or on-line child abuse. We evaluate two methods for Picture-to-Identity linking based on two existing SPN comparison techniques, on a benchmark data set of publicly accessible social network accounts collected from the Internet. The reported results are promising and show that such technique has a practical value for forensic practitioners., QC 20150610

It is becoming increasingly clear that a dysfunction of the GABAergic/glutamatergic network in telencephalic brain structures may be the pathogenetic mechanism underlying psychotic symptoms in schizophrenia (SZ) and bipolar (BP) disorder patients. Data obtained in Costa's laboratory (1996-2009) suggest that this dysfunction may be mediated primarily by a downregulation in the expression of GABAergic genes (e.g., glutamic acid decarboxylase 67 [GAD 67] and reelin) associated with DNA methyltransferase (DNMT)-dependent hypermethylation of their promoters. A pharmacological strategy to reduce the hypermethylation of GABAergic promoters is to administer drugs, such as the histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitor valproate (VPA), that induce DNA-demethylation when administered at doses that facilitate chromatin remodeling. The benefits elicited by combining VPA with antipsychotics in the treatment of BP disorder suggest that an investigation of the epigenetic interaction of these drugs is warranted. Our studies in mice suggest that when associated with VPA, clinically relevant doses of clozapine elicit a synergistic potentiation of VPA-induced GABAergic promoter demethylation. Olanzapine and quetiapine (two clozapine congeners) also facilitate chromatin remodeling but at doses higher than used clinically, whereas haloperidol and risperidone are inactive. Hence, the synergistic potentiation of VPA's action on chromatin remodeling by clozapine appears to be a unique property of the dibenzepines and is independent of their action on catecholamine or serotonin receptors. By activating DNA-demethylation, the association of clozapine or its derivatives with VPA or other more potent and selective HDAC inhibitors may be considered a promising treatment strategy for normalizing GABAergic promoter hypermethylation and the GABAergic gene expression downregulation detected in the postmortem brain of SZ and BP disorder patients. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled 'Trends in