RATIONALE, AIMS AND OBJECTIVES: This paper deals with the problem of surgical waiting lists and is aimed, in particular, at comparing two different prioritization approaches: (1) the clinical assessment of treatment urgency aimed at categorizing patients into urgency-related groups (URGs) with a given recommended maximum waiting time for treatment; and (2) the implementation of an original prioritization scoring algorithm aimed at determining the relative priority of each patient in the waiting list and the corresponding order of admission. METHODS: A modelling (...) exercise based on a cohort of 236 patients enrolled on the waiting list of a surgical department in an Italian public university hospital, from 1 January to 30 June 2004, is presented. The comparison is based on a measure called need-adjusted-waiting-days, which allows to take into proper account both urgency and priority. RESULTS: The results show that both methods should be implemented simultaneously for increasing the department's performance in terms of both efficiency--outcome gained from a given amount of resources--and equity--how patients are admitted according to their need. CONCLUSIONS: Waiting list prioritization should not be limited to classifying patients into URGs, but to using a scoring system as well, in order to schedule patient admissions in an explicit and transparent way. (shrink)

In this essay, an attempt is made to formalize the idea of analogy in a way which is as faithful as possible to Thomas Aquinas’ theory of analogy. To accomplish this, we must first present Aquinas’ theory of analogy as it appears in his main works; we then express the contents of Aquinas’ theory of analogy using Leśniewski’s Ontology, a symbolic language which is both rigorous and true to the spirit of Aquinas’ philosophy. In doing this we present definitions and (...) theorems lying outside the scope of Leśniewski’s Elementary Ontology and we demostrate that the notion of “to be the definition of” is not an extensional functor. (shrink)

Selezione di testi di recente pubblicazione, a cura della Redazione.

Titoli e abstracts di testi recentemente pubblicati, segnalati dalla Redazione di Nóema per il loro rilievo scientifico e l'originalità della loro proposta tematica.

L’articolo prende in esame il tema della solidarietà nei testi più importanti di Henri de Lubac, mettendoli a confronto con quelli di Maurice Blonde, alla luce di un carteggio inedito tra i due autori.

Testis determination in most mammals is regulated by a genetic hierarchy initiated by the SRY gene. Early ovarian development has long been thought of as a default pathway switched on passively by the absence of SRY. Recent studies challenge this view and show that the ovary constantly represses male‐specific genes, from embryonic stages to adulthood. Notably, the absence of the crucial ovarian transcription factor FOXL2 (alone or in combination with other factors) induces a derepression of male‐specific genes during development, postnatally (...) and, even more interestingly, during adulthood. Strikingly, in the adult, targeted ablation of Foxl2 leads to a molecular transdifferentiation of the supporting cells of the ovary, which acquire cytological and transcriptomic characteristics of the supporting cells of the testes. These studies bring many answers to the field of gonadal determination, differentiation and maintenance, but also open many questions. (shrink)

Mammals have an XX:XY system of chromosomal sex determination in which a small heterochromatic Y controls male development. The Y contains the testis determining factor SRY, as well as several genes important in spermatogenesis. Comparative studies show that the Y was once homologous with the X, but has been progressively degraded, and now consists largely of repeated sequences as well as degraded copies of X linked genes. The small original X and Y have been enlarged by cycles of autosomal addition (...) to one partner, recombination onto the other and continuing attrition of the compound Y. This addition–attrition hypothesis predicts that the pseudoautosomal region of the human X is merely the last relic of the latest addition. Genes (including SRY) on the conserved or added region of the Y evolved functions in male sex determination and differentiation distinct from the general functions of their X‐linked partners. Although the gonadogenesis pathway is highly conserved in vertebrates, its control has probably changed radically and rapidly in vertebrate – even mammalian – evolution. (shrink)

Pitagora maestro di scuola (P.Br.Libr. Add. Ms. 37516.1) -- Il carteggio fra Dario ed Eraclito (Diog. Laert. 9.13-14) -- Il sapiente e le città. Parmenide e una congettura involontaria su B 1.3 -- Empedocle e il tempo inestinguibile (B 16 DK) -- Empedocle e la lanterna (B 84.3 DK) -- Ippodamo de Mileto filosofo e architetto -- Tre note su Diogene di Apollonia (A 19.39; A 19.44-45; B 1 DK) -- Diogene di Sinope e le particelle vaporizzate (Diog. Laert. 6.73=SSR (...) B V 132). (shrink)