ABSTRACT
Health Literacy (HL) is the degree to which individuals have the capability to obtain, understand and process basic health information needed to make appropriate health decisions. It affects persons' ability to access and use health care, to interact with providers, and to care for themselves. Established literacy screeners have practical limitations (such as practictioner's attendance, time to complete, etc.): to address these, a short, self-administered measure of HL, the Medical Term Recognition Test (METER) was introduced in USA. In this study an Italian version (IMETER) of this measure has been validated administering it to undergraduate students, attending Medicine, Arts and Engineering faculties. The results of this study show a high degree of reliability and validity of the test when comparing the skills of students educated in medical matters and those of non-biological faculties, indicating the potential capability of the tool to screen low HL levels in larger population. Despite the limits of this pilot study, IMETER's quick and easy administration method seems useful not only in clinical settings, but also to ease the implementation of future larger studies.
Subject(s)
Health Literacy , Terminology as Topic , Female , Humans , Italy , Language , Male , Pilot Projects , Self Report , Young AdultABSTRACT
The Third General Report of the Malaria Commission, printed in 1933, suggested for the control of malaria a strategy aimed to promote the acquisition of a "relative immunity" through a non radical treatment of the infected people living in highly endemic areas. The paper discusses the content of the Report and describes the scientific (empirical) premises on which it stood. Moreover, it illustrates the criticism that was directed against the immunological strategy and that eventually led to its abandonment.
Subject(s)
Malaria/history , History, 20th Century , Humans , Immunity, Innate , Malaria/immunology , Malaria/prevention & controlSubject(s)
Archives/history , Malaria/history , Historiography , History, 19th Century , History, 20th Century , Humans , ItalyABSTRACT
This editorial note presents the journal initiative to celebrate the Malariology Centenary. It includes the reprint of the first annual report of the Society for Malaria Studies (founded in 1898), presented by Angelo Celli on December 3rd, 1898, to the first meeting of the Society and published in the Journal of the Royal Italian Society of Hygiene (volume 20, issue 12, 31st December 1898). The text is followed by explanatory footnotes and relevant references. An exhaustive historical essai, including the english version of the Celli's report, is scheduled to appear as supplement to volume 41, and the same volume will host the contributions issued from the international conference. "The malaria challenge after one hundred years of malariology", held in Roma at the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei on November 16-19, 1998.
Subject(s)
Malaria/history , Animals , Anopheles , History, 19th Century , Humans , Insect Vectors , Italy , Parasitology/history , Societies, Scientific/historySubject(s)
Entomology/history , Malaria/history , Parasitology/history , Animals , Anopheles , History, 19th Century , History, 20th Century , Humans , Insect Control/history , Italy , PlasmodiumABSTRACT
According to the Hippocratic medicine remittent and intermittent fevers were caused by bad air (mal'aria) and bad water of marshes, which produced miasmata affecting people living near these environments. This wrong theory was remarkably stable and persistent until the end of the last century, being in fact quite adequate to decribe the epidemiology of malaria in Mediterranean areas, where the transmission of the parasite depended on mosquitoes breeding mainly in marsh ecosystems. The theory was even reinforced with the spreading of severe malaria due to Plasmodium falciparum (more closely associated with warm marshy areas) and when a specific remedy, quinine, came into the picture, improving the distinction of malaria from other fever diseases. After the discovery of the true causes of malaria infection and transmission, scientific medicine developed completely new definitions of malarious environments based on their stratification in terms of transmission risk and several parameters were introduced which provide a measure of the vectorial capacity. This paper focus on the most relevant historical events that have brought to the present knowledge of malarious environments, examining at the same time the effectiveness and limits of the Hippocratic view on the etiology of malaria.
Subject(s)
Endemic Diseases/history , Environmental Pollution/history , Malaria/history , Environment , Epidemiologic Factors , History, 19th Century , History, 20th Century , History, Ancient , Humans , Mediterranean RegionSubject(s)
Neurology/history , Psychiatry/history , History, 18th Century , History, 19th Century , History, 20th Century , Humans , ItalyABSTRACT
The description of agammaglobulinemia by O. Bruton in 1952 and later clinical studies by R. Good preceeded by sporadic clinical observations on deficits in the immune function associated with hyponutrition, nephrosis and tumors or with inborn errors of metabolism have all made their contribution to the emerging of the concept of immunological deficiency diseases. The clinical-pathogenetic description of immunological deficiency diseases has played a fundamental role in the understanding of the anatomo-functional bases of the immune system and research work on the phylogenetic and ontogenetic evolution of the immune response. Various methodologies, from the idea of experimentum naturae to molecular pathology, combine to define and direct this research, the result of an ongoing interaction between the hospital and the laboratory. This leads to a necessary theoretical-practical synthesis and contributes to the consolidation of an immunologically-directed medicine.
