The electrocardiogram (ECG) is a non-invasive and cost-effective screening tool that is widely available and has been incorporated into many pre-participation screening programs for athletes. Despite historical criticisms regarding its suboptimal specificity, which could impact cost-effectiveness, the ECG remains a fundamental diagnostic method. Over the last 2 decades, significant research has focused on distinguishing pathological from physiological ECG patterns, the latter associated with the "athlete’s heart". The most recent guidelines for ECG interpretation in athletes include the International Criteria, published in 2017, which categorize ECG findings into common (training related), uncommon (training unrelated), and a "borderline" sub-group, with findings that do not necessitate further investigation when isolated. Premature ventricular beats (PVBs), although often overlooked, are a frequent cause of secondary investigations in athletes, especially when detected during exercise testing. Recent advances over the past decade have refined diagnostic methodologies, placing greater emphasis on morphological features, exercise relationships, and reproducibility, rather than solely on the count of PVBs. This evolution aims to enhance stratification for further investigations, such as cardiac magnetic resonance, which is crucial within this updated diagnostic framework, as it identifies pathologies causing sudden cardiac death during exercise. This review aims to provide a modern revision of the interpretation of ECGs and PVBs, incorporating a historical excursus to trace the evolution of these criteria. It is designed to offer clinicians a practical key for enhanced diagnostic precision in athlete screenings, reflecting both past insights and current advances.

The electrocardiogram (ECG) is a non-invasive and cost-effective screening tool that is widely available and has been incorporated into many pre-participation screening programs for athletes. Despite historical criticisms regarding its suboptimal specificity, which could impact cost-effectiveness, the ECG remains a fundamental diagnostic method. Over the last 2 decades, significant research has focused on distinguishing pathological from physiological ECG patterns, the latter associated with the "athlete’s heart". The most recent guidelines for ECG interpretation in athletes include the International Criteria, published in 2017, which categorize ECG findings into common (training related), uncommon (training unrelated), and a "borderline" sub-group, with findings that do not necessitate further investigation when isolated. Premature ventricular beats (PVBs), although often overlooked, are a frequent cause of secondary investigations in athletes, especially when detected during exercise testing. Recent advances over the past decade have refined diagnostic methodologies, placing greater emphasis on morphological features, exercise relationships, and reproducibility, rather than solely on the count of PVBs. This evolution aims to enhance stratification for further investigations, such as cardiac magnetic resonance, which is crucial within this updated diagnostic framework, as it identifies pathologies causing sudden cardiac death during exercise. This review aims to provide a modern revision of the interpretation of ECGs and PVBs, incorporating a historical excursus to trace the evolution of these criteria. It is designed to offer clinicians a practical key for enhanced diagnostic precision in athlete screenings, reflecting both past insights and current advances.

The aim of these evidence-based guidelines is to present a consensus position from members of the Italian Unitary Society of Colon-Proctology (Società Italiana Unitaria di Colon-Proctologia, SIUCP) on the diagnosis and management of hemorrhoidal disease, with the goal of guiding physicians in the choice of the best treatment option. A panel of experts was charged by the Board of the SIUCP to develop key questions on the main topics related to the management of hemorrhoidal disease and to perform an accurate and comprehensive literature search on each topic, in order to provide evidence-based answers to the questions and to summarize them in statements. All the clinical questions were discussed by the expert panel in multiple rounds through the Delphi approach and, for each statement, a consensus among the experts was reached. The questions were created according to PICO (patients, intervention, comparison, and outcomes) criteria, and the statements were developed adopting the GRADE (Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluations) methodology. In cases of grade 1 hemorrhoidal prolapse, outpatient procedures including hemorrhoidal laser procedure and sclerotherapy may be considered the preferred surgical options. For grade 2 prolapse, nonexcisional procedures including outpatient treatments, hemorrhoidal artery ligation and mucopexy, laser hemorrhoidoplasty, the Rafaelo procedure, and stapled hemorrhoidopexy may represent the first-line treatment options, whereas excisional surgery may be considered in selected cases. In cases of grades 3 and 4, stapled hemorrhoidopexy and hemorrhoidectomy may represent the most effective procedures, even if, in the expert panel opinion, stapled hemorrhoidopexy represents the gold-standard treatment for grade 3 hemorrhoidal prolapse.

Objective: Controlling the incisal inclination is fundamental in orthodontics. However, the relationship between the inclination prescription and its clinical outcome is not obvious, and the incisal inclination changes generated by different bracket prescriptions were investigated. Methods: Twenty-eight nonextraction dental Class II patients (15 females, 13 males; mean age = 12.9) were retrospectively analyzed. Patients were treated using passive self-ligating fixed appliances with three inclination prescriptions for maxillary incisors (high, standard, low), and two for mandibular incisors (standard, low). Clinical outcomes were compared among different prescriptions, and regression analysis was used to explain the effects of bracket prescriptions and to understand the prescription selection criteria (α = 0.05). Results: For maxillary central incisors, low and high prescriptions were related to linguoversion (p = 0.046) and labioversion (p = 0.005), respectively, while standard prescription maintained the initial dental inclination. Maxillary lateral incisors did not show significant changes. For mandibular incisors, low prescription led to linguoversion (p = 0.005 for central incisors, p = 0.010 for lateral incisors), while standard prescription led to labioversion (p = 0.045 for central incisors, p = 0.005 for lateral incisors). The factors affecting inclination changes were the imposed change and selected prescription, while prescription selection was influenced by the initial dental inclination and initial intercanine distance. Conclusions The direction of correction of incisal inclination can be controlled by choosing a certain prescription, but the final inclination may show limited consistency with it. The amount of imposed inclination change was the most relevant predictor of the clinical outcome.

Resistance to sliding (RS) between the bracket, wire, and ligature has been largely debated in orthodontics. Despite the extensive number of published studies, the lack of discussion of the methods used has led to little understanding of this phenomenon. The aim of this study was to discuss variables affecting RS in orthodontics and to suggest an operative protocol. The search included PubMed©, Medline©, and the Cochrane Library©. References of full-text articles were manually analyzed. English-language articles published between January 2007 and January 2017 that performed an in vitro analysis of RS between the bracket, wire, and ligature were included. Study methods were analyzed based on the study design, description of materials, and experimental setup, and a protocol to standardize the testing methods was proposed. From 404 articles identified from the database search and 242 records selected from published references, 101 were eligible for the qualitative analysis, and six for the quantitative synthesis. One or more experimental parameters were incompatible and a meta-analysis was not performed. Major factors regarding the study design, materials, and experimental setup were not clearly described by most studies. The normal force, that is the force perpendicular to the sliding of the wire and one of the most relevant variable in RS, was not considered by most studies. Different variables were introduced, often acting as confounding factors. A protocol was suggested to standardize testing procedures and enhance the understanding of in vitro findings.
In Vitro Techniques ; Ligation ; Methods* ; Orthodontics*