A corpus of Middle English medical prologues in the Sloane Collection of The British Libray: an introduction to the genre in prose

[ES] Esta tesis trata sobre los prólogos a textos ingleses de carácter médico escritos o copiados en forma de prosa durante el siglo XV. En este trabajo se han contemplado dos objetivos generales: por un lado, la creación de un corpus con todos los prólogos inéditos que cumplen con estos criterios y que se encuentran en la colección de Sloana en la British Library de Londres, según Voigts & Kurtz: Scientific an Medical Writtings in Old and Middle English: An Electronic Reference (2000); y por otro, la presentación de estod prólogos como conjunto, incluyendo: los datos recopilados sobre la codicología de los manuscritos, afiliación de los textos, sus fuentes y el dialecto utilizado. Asimismo, como parte de esta presentación, se aporta un análisis original de la estructura, forma y contenido de los materiales seleccionados para el estudio. El propósito de esta tesis es llenar un hueco en la literatura académica acerca de los prólogos a textos médicos escritos en inglés medieval tardío, tal y como lo señala Voigts (1982:54)

Skeletal Markers of Activity: Methodological and Interpretative Reflections after the study of the whole Frassetto Sassari identified skeletal collection

Entheses (skeletal attachment sites of muscles and ligaments) and their pathologic modifications (enthesopathies) have long been used as skeletal markers of activity in bioarchaeological (reconstruction of past populations lifestyle) and forensic (personal identification) contexts. However, a functional interpretation of these markers have to deal critically with the multifactorial etiology of the same. Factors such as sex, age, genetic factors, mechanical stress, metabolic conditions, etc.. can compete to produce the observed morphological variability at each attachment site. The aim of this thesis has drawn on the ongoing debate about the informativeness of entheseal modifications as skeletal markers of activity and represent a deepening of the actual knowledge about the relationship between these characters and sex, age and physical activity. For this purpose, the whole "Frassetto” identified skeletal collection of Sassari (Sardinia, Italy) was analyzed. The collection includes the skeletal remains of about 600 individuals died in the late 19th and early 20th century for whom information regarding sex, age at death and, in many cases the occupation are known The results obtained highlight the great age importance on the entheseal modifications. The differences observed between sexes may reflect differences in the level or type of activity performed in life, but could also be related to a different bone tissue response to mechanical stress due to hormonal factors and different growth rates. The role of biomechanical stress related to professional activities remains doubtful. This is probably partly attributable to the analyzed sample characteristics (preponderance of farmers compared with other professions, different mean age of the considered professional subsamples), which has hampered the analysis of samples homogenous with regard to age, which is very influential on the entheses and enthesopathies expression.

New insights into methodology and interpretation of osteoarthritis. The study of Frassetto identified skeletal collection.

Osteoarthritis (OA) or degenerative joint disease (DJD) is a pathology which affects the synovial joints and characterised by a focal loss of articular cartilage and subsequent bony reaction of the subcondral and marginal bone. Its etiology is best explained by a multifactorial model including: age, sex, genetic and systemic factors, other predisposing diseases and functional stress. In this study the results of the investigation of a modern identified skeletal collection will be presented. In particular, we will focus on the relationship between the presence of OA at various joints. The joint modifications have been analysed using a new methodology that allows the scoring of different degrees of expression of the features considered. Materials and Methods The sample examined comes from the Sassari identified skeletal collection (part of “Frassetto collections”). The individuals were born between 1828 and 1916 and died between 1918 and 1932. Information about sex and age is known for all the individuals. The occupation is known for 173 males and 125 females. Data concerning the occupation of the individuals indicate a preindustrial and rural society. OA has been diagnosed when eburnation (EB) or loss of morphology (LM) were present, or when at least two of the following: marginal lipping (ML), esostosis (EX) or erosion (ER), were present. For each articular surface affected a “mean score” was calculated, reflecting the “severity” of the alterations. A further “score” was calculated for each joint. In the analysis sexes and age classes were always kept separate. For the statistical analyses non parametric test were used. Results The results show there is an increase of OA with age in all the joints analyzed and in particular around 50 years and 60 years. The shoulder, the hip and the knee are the joints mainly affected with ageing while the ankle is the less affected; the correlation values confirm this result. The lesion which show the major correlation with age is the ML. In our sample males are more frequently and more severely affected by OA than females, particularly at the superior limbs, while hip and knee are similarly affected in the two sexes. Lateralization shows some positive results in particular in the right shoulder of males and in various articular surfaces especially of the superior limb of both males and females; articular surfaces and joints are quite always lateralized to the right. Occupational analyses did not show remarkable results probably because of the homogeneity of the sample; males although performing different activities are quite all employed in stressful works. No highest prevalence of knee and hip OA was found in farm-workers respect to the other males. Discussion and Conclusion In this work we propose a methodology to score the different features, necessary to diagnose OA, that allows the investigation of the severity of joint degeneration. This method is easier than the one proposed by Buikstra and Ubelaker (1994), but in the same time allows a quite detailed recording of the features. Epidemiological results can be interpreted quite simply and they are in accordance with other studies; more difficult is the interpretation of the occupational results because many questions concerning the activities performed by the individuals of the collection during their lifespan cannot be solved. Because of this, caution is suggested in the interpretation of bioarcheological specimens. With this work we hope to contribute to the discussion on the puzzling problem of the etiology of OA. The possibility of studying identified skeletons will add important data to the description of osseous features of OA, enriching the medical documentation, based on different criteria. Even if we are aware that the clinical diagnosis is different from the palaeopathological one we think our work will be useful in clarifying some epidemiological as well as pathological aspects of OA.

Editorial reorganization of an alphabetically ordered collection of short stories: analysis of problems and hypothesis of possible solutions

This paper aims to show, analyze and solve the problems related to the translation of the book with meaning-bond alphabetically ordered chapter titles La vita non è in ordine alfabetico, by the Italian writer Andrea Bajani. The procedure is inevitable for a possible translation of the book, and it is necessary to have a preliminary pattern to follow. After translating the whole book, not only is a revision fundamental, but a restructure and reorganization of the collection may be required, hence, what this thesis offers is a scheme to start from, together with an analysis of the possible problems that may arise, and a useful method to find a solution.

High levels of circulating CD34+ cells at autologous stem cell collection are associated with favourable prognosis in multiple myeloma

High-dose chemotherapy with autologous stem cell transplantation is a cornerstone in the first-line treatment of multiple myeloma patients. However, only few factors have been identified affecting the outcome in such patients. We hypothesised that varying levels of mobilised CD34+ cells confer prognostic information in myeloma patients undergoing high-dose chemotherapy.

The Costs of Municipal Curbside Recycling and Waste Collection

This paper estimates cost functions for both municipal solid waste collection and disposal services and curbside recycling programs. Cost data are obtained from a national survey of randomly selected municipalities. Results suggest, perhaps unsurprisingly, that both marginal and average costs of recycling systems exceed those of waste collection and disposal systems. Economies of scale are estimated for all observed quantities of waste collection and disposal. Economies of scale for recycling disappear at high levels of recycling - marginal and average cost curves for recycling take on the usual U-shape. Waste and recycling costs are also estimated as functions of factor costs and program attributes.