Antonia Francesca Franchini’s research while affiliated with University of Milan and other places

In this paper, we present the results of toxicological analyses of preserved brain tissue and bone samples from the remains of the seventeenth century patients of the Ospedale Maggiore, the main hospital in Milan and one of the most innovative hospitals in Europe from the Renaissance period. Beneath it, the crypt functioned as the burial place for the deceased of the hospital. In this multidisciplinary study of the remains, toxicological analyses in particular were performed with HPLC–MS/MS on different biological samples from nine individuals. Anthropological, paleopathological, histological, radiological examinations and radiocarbon dating were also carried out. As a result, archeotoxicological analyses revealed the presence of codeine, morphine, noscapine and papaverine, derived from Papaver somniferum, a plant present in the hospital pharmacopeia used as a narcotic, analgesic, astringent, coagulant, and antitussive agent. Such analyses have shed light on the pharmacological therapies administered to the patients near the time of death and have implemented our knowledge of medical treatment and drug administration in the 1600’s.

Synesthesia gave rise to an important debate in nineteenth-century Europe that was influenced by the Symbolist movement and research into the physiology of perception. Yet, efforts to understand sensory modalities and to pictorially translate musical effects, or vice versa, are very ancient in origin. For example, the ability to coordinate colors and sounds was well known in the ancient cultures of India and China. Similarly, in sixth-century Greece, Pythagoras (570 BC–495 BC) assigned numbers as well as colors to musical notes. There was also interest in how the various sensory modalities were able to reveal the distinctive properties of an object and if these experiences could be translated or shared with others. This chapter examines the foundations of the nineteenth-century debate, the importance of the cultural aspect of synesthesia, and the subsequent search for a neurological explanation. As we show, the lively European debate included Italian, French, English, Swiss, and German scientists who were stimulated to study the relationship between color and sound, music and painting, and the creativity associated with synesthetes. Among the researchers discussed are Carlo Botta (1766–1837), Alfred Vulpian (1826–1887), Filippo Lussana (1820–1897), and Eugene Bleuler (1857–1939). The paper also looks at the three forms of synesthesia related to the debate (metaphoric, constitutional, and pathological) from both historical and contemporary perspectives. Finally, we examine the role of emotion in the various forms of musical synesthesia and possible neuronal well-being.KeywordsMusic synesthesiaEmotionBrainWell-being

Terminology, technology, communication and organizational strategies are different but we tried to compare the mass vaccination campaign against smallpox with the one we are doing against coronavirus.

Baldo Rossi (Pioltello, Milano, 1868 - Milano, 1932) fu chirurgo dell'Ospedale Maggiore di Milano a cavallo fra il secolo XIX e il secolo XX. Egli operò prima della diffusione dei sulfamidici, e può da un lato essere considerato fra gli ultimi chirurghi della vecchia guar- dia, quanto alla sua formazione universitaria, mentre dall'altro fu estremamente attento alla modernità e all'innovazione. Fu protagonista dei grandi sviluppi della chirurgia asettica, della traumatologia, dell'ortopedia, della chirurgia militare, della riabilitazione. Attraverso la sua ergobiografia si possono ripercorrere tappe fondamentali dello sviluppo dell'Ospedale Maggiore milanese. Nel saggio si sottolinea anche l'importanza di alcune fonti, quali i cataloghi della produzione industriale degli strumenti chirurgici, per la rico- struzione di avvenimenti della storia ospedaliera, ai quali Baldo Rossi diede fondamentali contributi.

Più di ottant’anni fa le cosiddette Leggi Razziali espulsero gli Ebrei Italiani dalle loro proprietà e da ogni luogo. Gli autori analizzano l’ergobiografia di salomone Enrico Emilio Franco, un anatomopatologo cosmopolita. Nato a Trieste, ma educato a Venezia, egli condusse la sua formazione medica a Padova, fu anatomopatologo all’Ospedale Civile di Venezia, per poi raggiungere il Portogallo. Franco fondò l’Istituto di Patologia Generale dell’Università di Lisbona. Studiò la leishmaniosi e si dedicò a ricerche di ematologia. Durante la Prima Guerra Mondiale combatté come volontario nel R. Esercito italiano. Fu poi professore di Anatomia patologia nelle Università di Sassari, Bari e Pisa, ma le cosiddette Leggi Razziali lo costrinsero a trovare rifugio in Palestina. Combatté come volontario per la creazione di Eretz Yisrael, ed indi diresse l’Istituto di Patologia della Hadassah a Gerusalemme.

The authors analyse descriptions of Greenlandic and Faroese medicine found in an Italian medical publication from the 18th century entitled, Europae Medicina a Sapientibus Illustrata […], which was printed in Brescia, in Northern Italy, in 1747. The author of these descriptions, Francesco Roncalli Parolino (1692–1769), was a renowned European physician. Roncalli Parolino focused his study on the treatment of scurvy and he promoted the inclusion of the Greenlandic and Faroese therapy into the broader European context. He was influenced to do this due to the already integrated European perspective of medicine which his book follows. Like now, medicine in 18th-century Europe was multicentric and characterised by rich intellectual activity, which contributed to the enhancement of clinical practice during this period. At the time, Greenland and Faroe Islands were also integrated into this European context because they contributed for medical-scientific development that would lay the foundations for modern medicine. Francesco Roncalli Parolino obtained just recognition for these regions through the advancement and defence of their valuable medical contributions.

Syphilis was a widespread infectious disease in 17th‐century Italy, commonly treated with mercury‐based ointments and fumigations. Few reports exist on the analysis of abnormally high Hg levels in bone as a result of exposure to mercury‐containing anti‐syphilitic medicine. In this research, two crania recovered among the 2.9 million commingled bones resting under the crypt of the former hospital of the poor of Milan were submitted to pathological, radiological and toxicological analysis. The crania showed gummatous lesions characteristic of tertiary syphilis and inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP‐MS) analysis revealed over the double values of Hg in bone relative to that of the control sample. Archival documentation confirms the presence and use of mercury‐based treatments in the pharmacy of the hospitals of Milan. Consequently, the individuals probably came into contact with mercury as a treatment for syphilis, confirming its medical use in 17th‐century Milan and strengthening our knowledge of the history of medicine.

The Corona Virus 19 (COVID 19) epidemic is an infectious disease which was declared as a pandemic and hit all the Countries, all over the world, from the beginning of the year 2020. There are many similarities between the COVID 19 epidemic and the Spanish flu epidemic. We considered some preventive measures which do not change in the two epidemics.

L’autrice affronta il tema del panorama medico chirurgico, che Milano poteva offrire a cavallo fra la fine dell’Ottocento e gli inizi del Novecento. Le svolte conoscitive acquisite a partire dalla metà dell’Ottocento condussero alla nascita di specializzazioni medico- chirurgiche, al sorgere di nuove possibilità nella prevenzione e nella cura delle malattie e alla creazione di una rete sanitaria e assistenziale capillare, sulla quale si poterono innestare prospettive formative molto sviluppate. L’esempio di una istituzione destinata alla cura degli esiti di forme traumatiche, sorta in Milano agli inizi del XX secolo è emblematico, non solo perché correlato agli infortuni sul lavoro, ma anche perché spiega la necessità di avere a disposizione specialisti di varie discipline medico chirurgiche al servizio di tutta la popolazione.

BACKGROUND In the 1950s, occupational medicine and occupational psychology found a common field of action in the Clinica del Lavoro in Milan. OBJECTIVES This study aims to analyze and document how this encounter took place and, in particular, the contribution of the Clinica del Lavoro to the development of occupational psychology in Italy. METHODS Historical sources of that period were investigated. RESULTS Before the 1950s, experimental psychology was only taught at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart in Milan. The first professor of clinical psychology in the School of Medicine at the State University of Milan, was Marcello Cesa-Bianchi (1926-2018). He collaborated with the graphic, textile and pharmaceutical industries for the personnel training and management, and carried out important research in occupational psychology on behalf of the European Coal and Steel Community. The Chair of Clinical Psychology was initially located in the Clinica del Lavoro and the activity of the team of Cesa-Bianchi was oriented towards the elaboration of professional profiles and job analysis. In those years Cesa-Bianchi also conducted pioneering research in the field of psycho-gerontology. CONCLUSIONS The historical experience that integrated psychology and occupational medicine in the scientific context of Milan contains a series of values, useful to today's reflection and practice. Our work also undelines the importance of preserving historical documents: only a better knowledge of history can guarantee a better destiny.