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E Romanini

Publications and source records attributed to E Romanini.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2003

The Italian version of the Oxford 12-item Knee Questionnaire-cross-cultural adaptation and validation.

Questionnaires must be translated and adapted to suit the cultural characteristics of different countries with different languages; they then need to be validated using a standard process. This was done for the Italian version of the Oxford Knee Questionnaire (OKQ), and its reliability and validity were assessed in a cross-sectional study of 50 consecutive patients referred for gonarthrosis and whose knees were replaced. A "subsample" of 20 patients was assessed prospectively to confirm the reliability of the Italian version, and these results were then compared with other clinical studies. The Italian OKQ scale correlated well with other clinical studies and also showed good results with regard to reproducibility, consistency, and validity when compared to the other published versions of the OKQ.

Aged↗
PubMed2003

Italian version of the Disability of the Arm, Shoulder and Hand (DASH) questionnaire. Cross-cultural adaptation and validation.

An Italian version of the Disability of the Arm, Shoulder and Hand (DASH) questionnaire has been devised and its reliability and validity have been assessed in a cross-sectional study of 108 consecutive patients with upper extremity pathologies. A sub-sample of 30 patients was used to assess re-test reliability. The principal DASH scale showed a high correlation with other patient-oriented measures and demonstrated good reproducibility, consistency and validity, which were similar to those for other languages' versions of DASH. These findings suggest that the evaluation capacities of the Italian DASH are equivalent to those of other language versions of the DASH.

Arm↗
PubMed2001

Cross-cultural adaptation of the lumbar North American Spine Society questionnaire for Italian-speaking patients with lumbar spinal disease.

STUDY DESIGN: A cross-cultural adaptation and cross-sectional study of a sample of lumbar spine patients, with a subsample followed prospectively for retest reliability. OBJECTIVES: To assess the Italian version instrument reliability and validity. SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA: The orthopaedic outcome measurements have been usually focused on objective parameters as radiograph measures or other technical aspects. However, these parameters are weakly related with outcomes that are more relevant to patients as functional status and symptoms. In the last ten years, the patient-oriented measures have become an important aspect of spinal clinical outcome evaluation. The most common instruments to assess patient perspective are self-administered questionnaires that must be validated by a widely accepted process to evaluate reliability and validity, which are fundamental for every instrumental measure. METHODS: The North American Spine Society (NASS) questionnaire was culturally adapted for Italian-speaking people following the Guillemin criteria. The Italian version was tested on 74 consecutive patients who were referred to the authors' department and suffered from low back pain with leg irradiation. The results were compared with other validated patient-oriented measures. Forty-eight-hour retests were performed on a subsample of 45 patients. RESULTS: The questionnaire was favorably accepted by patients. The lumbar spine pain and disability and neurogenic symptoms subscales showed a high correlation with other patient-oriented measures, as hypothesized, and it also showed good values on test-retest. CONCLUSIONS: The questionnaire should be considered for patient health status monitoring and for clinical trials.

Cross-Cultural Comparison↗
PubMed2001

Italian version of the Roland Disability Questionnaire, specific for low back pain: cross-cultural adaptation and validation.

Over the last 10 years, patient-oriented evaluations using questionnaires have become an important aspect of clinical spinal outcome studies. Any questionnaire must be translated and culturally adapted in order to be used with different language groups, and the translated version must then be evaluated for reliability and validity, which are fundamental attributes of any measurement tool. The Roland Disability Questionnaire, a low back pain disease-specific tool, was submitted to translation into Italian and to cross-cultural adaptation following the Guillemin criteria. It was then validated on 70 patients (37 male and 33 female; mean age 58, range: 28-67) suffering from low back pain as assessed by clinical examination, imaging and also electromyography in cases of suspected neurological impairment. The test-retest reliability, assessed with intraclass correlation, was 0.92 and the internal consistency reached a Cronbach's alpha of 0.82. The Italian version of the Roland Disability Questionnaire satisfied the validation criteria, showing characteristics of reliability and validity similar to previously published versions translated and adapted for other countries.

Adult↗
PubMed2001

Patient outcomes after Harrington instrumentation for idiopathic scoliosis: a 15- to 28-year evaluation.

STUDY DESIGN: A retrospective study was performed, using the Short Form-36 Health Survey and the Roland and Morris Disability Questionnaire, to investigate patient outcomes after fusion for adolescent idiopathic scoliosis using Harrington rod instrumentation. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate health-related quality of life and low back pain in a long-term follow-up study of surgery for adolescent idiopathic scoliosis. SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA: The commonly accepted surgical treatment for idiopathic evolutive scoliosis is vertebral fusion. It has been suggested that this procedure may cause low back pain and a poor quality of life over the long term. Outcome measures after surgery for adolescent idiopathic scoliosis have focused mainly on objective parameters such as radiographic measures. However, this information has proved to be correlated only weakly with outcomes that are more relevant to patients, such as functional status and symptoms. Until recently, only a few long-term outcome studies have used standardized and validated patient-oriented tools to evaluate surgically treated patients with scoliosis. METHODS: In this study, 70 patients treated with a standard Harrington technique were recontacted and evaluated by means of self-administered questionnaires (Short Form-36 Health Survey and Roland and Morris Disability, clinical examination, and radiographic analysis. Preoperative and follow-up radiographic findings were registered. Relations between radiographic and patient-oriented data were evaluated. RESULTS: A comparison between the current sample and the Italian age-matched normative data for the Short Form-36 Health Survey showed them to have a similar pattern. Findings showed the patient-oriented outcome to be correlated inversely with the extension of vertebral fusion and the preoperative Cobb angle. CONCLUSION: Long-term follow-up evaluation of Harrington rod fusion for adolescent idiopathic scoliosis showed no important impairment of health-related quality of life, as measured by patient-oriented evaluation.

Adult↗
PubMed2001

Duodenal IgE-positive cells and elimination diet responsiveness in children with atopic dermatitis.

BACKGROUND: Parameters for identifying eczematous children who could respond to an elimination diet are needed. In children with food allergy, duodenal IgE-containing cells are enhanced. OBJECTIVE: To determine the presence of duodenal mucosal IgE-positive cells in atopic dermatitis and to determine whether duodenal IgE-positive cells may identify eczematous children who will benefit from an elimination diet. METHODS: Thirty-one children with severe eczema underwent gastrointestinal endoscopy because of gastrointestinal symptoms and were treated with an elimination diet. A clinical score to skin lesions was given before and after diet. All subjects were skin-prick tested with food antigens and aeroallergens. Serum IgE levels were measured. Duodenal IgE-positive cells were investigated in 18 control subjects and in all eczematous children before diet. RESULTS: The number of duodenal IgE-positive cells in children with atopic dermatitis was significantly increased compared with that of control group (P < 0.001). Nineteen (61%) eczematous children improved on a few food diet. Diet-responsive children had significantly higher IgE-positive cells compared with both nondiet-responsive and controls. Positive predictive accuracy of duodenal IgE-positive cells was poor, whereas negative predictive accuracy was high at the cutoff level of 50 IgE-positive cells/10 visual fields. Diagnostic accuracy both of SPT reactions with foods and of food-specific serum IgE antibodies was poor. CONCLUSIONS: An intestinal IgE-mediated reaction occurred in children with severe atopic dermatitis who underwent intestinal endoscopy because of gastrointestinal symptoms. In these eczematous children, the number of IgE-positive cells in the duodenal mucosa might be helpful for excluding a positive response to the elimination diet.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2000

[Digestive endoscopy in children].

Also in the pediatric population the digestive endoscopy became, at this point, a very good diagnostic and operative technique largement used. The endoscopy can explore the upper gastrointestinal tract (esophagus, stomach, duodenum and jejunum) and can investigate the colon and the terminal ileum regarding the lower gastrointestinal tract. Principally, the operative endoscopy concerns emostasis of gastrointestinal bleeding, polipectomy, extraction of foreign bodies, and intestinal dilatations. The patients population submitted to this investigation by now is very wide thanks to the modernization of the instruments and at specialization of gastroenterologist pediatricians: range from newborn, to childhood, adolescence and young adults. The gastroenterologist pediatricians specialization associated to a routine use of amnemonic drugs (benzodiazepine) reduced at the minimum the invasivity of endoscopy; this technique can be considered a good safe procedure and free of important physical and psychic side effects for the young patient.

Child↗
PubMed2000

[Digestive endoscopy in neonates. Personal experience].

Gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopy is actually considered an essential diagnostic and therapeutic technique both in pediatrician and in newborn infants. At the moment upper GI endoscopy in neonatal age allows to explore the esophagus, stomach and duodenum; instead lower GI endoscopy easily reaches sigmoid-colon junction. The exploration of other distal parts of bowel is more difficult and with more risks. Therefore it has to be make only if it is necessary. In the newborn this exam should be so fast not to require premedication. In our study, we considered every neonatal patient who underwent GI endoscopy at the "Digestive Endoscopy and Gastroenterology Service of Pediatric Clinic-University of Parma" (from September 1983 to June 2000). We considered two groups of patients: first group: early neonatal age (0-14 days) second group: late neonatal age (15-28 days). We made 127 endoscopies: 112 of these were upper GI. The most frequent symptoms that babies showed and indicated upper GI endoscopy were reflux and/or vomiting (86%). Upper operative GI endoscopies included also 7 esophageal dilatations. The lower GI endoscopies were 15 and in all the cases the indication was intestinal bleeding. We conclude that the GI endoscopy in the neonates shows a diagnostic sensibility and specificity really high and for sure better than the radiology for mucosal lesions. Also GI endoscopy can be not only a very precious diagnostic instrument but also therapeutic in neonatal disease. Considering the age of the little patients, it is very important that only endoscopists with large experience use this technique.

Age Factors↗
PubMed1999

Ten- to 15-year outcome of surgery for lumbar disc herniation: radiographic instability and clinical findings.

The most appropriate treatment for radiculopathy associated with disc pathology is still controversial. Since 1934, surgical treatment has consisted of hemilaminectomy and removal of the herniated material. Many authors believe that these procedures may cause degenerative spondylosis and vertebral instability. Several surgical methods have been proposed, but the long-term effects are still being debated. In addition there appear to be few well-designed outcome studies on the management of this disease. In the present study, 150 patients were selected for surgery with strict criteria and all treated with the standard technique. The series was evaluated by subjective analyses (Roland questionnaire; 120 patients), objective examinations (68 patients - 56.6%) and radiographic studies including dynamic views (analyzed by the Taillard and Boxall methods) to establish the presence of vertebral instability (50 patients - 41.6%). The subjective and objective analyses showed a high rate of good results. Radiographic studies showed vertebral instability in 30 cases, but only 9 were symptomatic. Recurrences were not observed and only a few patients suffered from leg pain. The standard procedure for lumbar disc herniation showed good results at 10- and 15-year follow-up.

Adult↗
PubMed1999

Bilateral congenital pseudarthrosis of the clavicle report of a case with clinical, radiological and neurophysiological evaluation.

Congenital pseudarthrosis of the clavicle is a rare condition. Bilateral involvement is extremely rare: only seven cases have been reported in the literature. Although the anatomy of the thoracic outlet can be markedly altered by the hypermobility of the shoulder and although few cases with mild symptoms suggesting brachial plexus impairment have been reported, the neurological status of the brachial plexus in congenital pseudarthrosis of the clavicle has not been well assessed. We report a case of bilateral congenital pseudarthrosis of the clavicle in which clinical, neurophysiological and radiological evaluations were performed.

Child, Preschool↗
PubMed1998

Italian multicentre study of carpal tunnel syndrome: study design. Italian CTS Study Group.

In September 1996, during a carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) symposium, the Italian CTS Study Group was funded. The group designed a strict clinical and neurophysiological protocol for performing a wide multicentre study on idiopathic CTS in hands. In addition to the traditional evaluations, the group also adopted a validated patient-oriented measurement in order to obtain comprehensive and reliable data for the clinical picture. The study was designed to: (1) better assess the clinical picture of the CTS population, especially using new measurement tools (patient-oriented); (2) evaluate the sensitivity of an electrodiagnostic protocol; (3) re-evaluate the validity of a neurophysiological classification; and (4) evaluate the influence of social status and quantify some of the aspects regarding economic and social costs. The study design is described.

Carpal Tunnel Syndrome↗
PubMed1998

Carpal tunnel syndrome: indication for surgical treatment based on electrophysiologic study.

A prospective study of 50 hands from 45 consecutive patients surgically treated for idiopathic carpal tunnel syndrome was conducted to determinate the recovery capacity of the median nerve after open surgical release. Subjects were evaluated by clinical history, physical examination, and electrophysiologic testing. Motor and sensory terminal latencies and motor and sensory conduction velocities were examined before surgery and 2 weeks, 2 months, and 6 months after surgical decompression. All patients showed improvement of postoperative electrophysiologic values; the amount of improvement was dependent on the degree of preoperative impairment. Complete restoration of clinical and electrophysiologic nerve function was observed only in patients with mild carpal tunnel syndrome.

Adult↗
PubMed1998

Clinical food hypersensitivity: the relevance of duodenal immunoglobulin E-positive cells.

Owing to poor reliability of laboratory tests, diagnosis of food allergy is based on clinical response to double-blind placebo-controlled food challenge. The aim of the present study was to assess the value of duodenal IgE-positive cells in the diagnosis of food allergy. Thirty-one children with a history of possible food allergy underwent duodenal biopsies, skin prick tests, and measurement of serum IgE antibodies, and were put on an elimination diet followed by food challenge. Open food challenges were performed in patients under 12 mo of age, and double-blind placebo-controlled challenges were for suspected foods. On the basis of clinical food hypersensitivity, patients were divided into two groups. Group 1 consisted of 13 children with food allergy. Thirteen of 20 positive provocations elicited reactions within 12 h from the end of the challenge, seven later. Group 2 was the control group and included 18 patients with negative food challenges. The number of IgE-positive cells in biopsy specimens was significantly more elevated in group 1 with respect to group 2 (153.24 +/- 83.13 versus 18.4 +/- 18.9; p < 0.01). Total serum IgE levels were elevated compared with that of the control group (p < 0.01) and correlated with the number of IgE-positive cells (p < 0.001, r = 0.62). Enhanced IgE-containing cells were found in all delayed reactors, but about one-third had negative skin prick tests or specific serum IgE antibodies to the offending foods. Our results showed that systemic reactions to foods are associated with an IgE-mediated response in the duodenal mucosa. Larger studies would be required to assess the predictive value of an increased number of IgE-positive cells in the diagnosis of allergy to food, especially in children with delayed reactions.

Animals↗
PubMed1992

Pharmacokinetics of two oral liquid formulations of oxatomide in children.

A study on the pharmacokinetics of two suspensions of oxatomide at the concentrations of 25 and 2.5 mg/ml was carried out on 12 children (7M, 5F) with a mean age of 9 years and weight of 29 kg. The plasmatic concentration peak, the time to reach the peak and the area under the curve displayed no significant differences between the two formulations. The maximum concentrations and the peak time of oxatomide in children are similar to those observed in adults.

Administration, Oral↗