• Research in Community and Public Health Nursing
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.131-139
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• 2021

Purpose: In adults with chronic diseases, unmet healthcare needs are likely to increase the risk of worsening the illness and complications. This study was conducted to explore factors affecting unmet healthcare needs among adults with chronic diseases. Methods: A cross sectional study was performed using the data from the seventh Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHANES VII), 2016-2017. The sample of this study consisted of 6,104 adults with chronic diseases. The data were analyzed by Rao-Scott 𝑥² test and logistic regression using complex samples analysis. Results: The proportion of subjects who experienced unmet healthcare needs was 10.9% of adults with chronic diseases. The factors affecting unmet healthcare needs of adults with chronic diseases were age, gender, employment status, household income, subjective health status, activity limitation, and perceived stress. Conclusion: The findings of this study suggest that various factors may be associated with their unmet healthcare needs. Finally, the development of strategies to reduce unmet healthcare needs for people with chronic diseases should consider the associated factors presented in the study.

• Clinical and Experimental Pediatrics
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• v.49 no.9
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• pp.937-945
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• 2006

The population of adult patients with congenital heart disease(CHD) has increased dramatically because of improved survival of infants and children with CHD. There are still a substantial number of adults with unrepaired CHD. Many adult patients do not know the possible problems of their disease such as ventricular dysfunction, arrhythmia, and what they should pay attention to. They often consider themselves "cured" or "healthy" if only they don't have overt symptoms, and visit hospitals only after deterioration of their problems. Some patients are neglected because they cannot be corrected surgically although careful medical support can improve their survival and quality of life. It is, therefore, essential that the patients, their families, and physicians understand the potential problems of CHD and need for regular follow-up. In this paper we will take a brief review for common medical problems of repaired or unrepaired CHD and also mention a few specific diseases which are common in adults.

• BMB Reports
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• v.56 no.2
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• pp.71-77
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• 2023

Cancers are one of the most dreaded diseases in human history and have been targeted by numerous trials including surgery, chemotherapy, radiation therapy, and anti-cancer drugs. Adult stem cells (ASCs), which can regenerate tissues and repair damage, have emerged as leading therapeutic candidates due to their homing ability toward tumor foci. Stem cells can precisely target malicious tumors, thereby minimizing the toxicity of normal cells and unfavorable side effects. ASCs, such as mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), neural stem cells (NSCs), and hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs), are powerful tools for delivering therapeutic agents to various primary and metastatic cancers. Engineered ASCs act as a bridge between the tumor sites and tumoricidal reagents, producing therapeutic substances such as exosomes, viruses, and anti-cancer proteins encoded by several suicide genes. This review focuses on various anti-cancer therapies implemented via ASCs and summarizes the recent treatment progress and shortcomings.

• Childhood Kidney Diseases
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.61-68
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• 2017

Purpose: To investigate differences in clinical features, blood/urinary findings, and prognosis in different age groups of patients with Henoch-$Sch{\ddot{o}}nlein$ purpura (HSP). Methods: A total of 469 patients with HSP were analyzed retrospectively from June 2003 to February 2016. We classified patients into child or adult groups based on their age. Results: The adult group had more patients with anemia (child vs. adult; 7.5% vs. 16.4%), and higher immunoglobulin A (IgA) (30.0% vs. 50.0%) levels, C-reactive protein (34.2% vs. 54.0%) and uric acid (3.1% vs. 12.1%) levels than the child group. The child group was highly positive for Mycoplasma pneumoniae immunoglobulin M (IgM) (34.4%). More patients in the child group presented with high levels of antistreptolysin O (24.7% vs. 2.9%) and high C4 (11.5% vs. 4.2%). Low C3 (1.1% vs. 10.2%) levels, and renal involvement with gross hematuria (8.6% vs. 21.5 %), nonnephrotic proteinuria (1.1% vs. 11.2%), and nephrotic syndrome (1.1% vs. 6.0%) were common in the adult group. Adults also had poorer renal outcomes [persistent hematuria/proteinuria (10.5% vs. 32.8%), and chronic kidney disease (0% vs. 11.2%)] than the child group. Risk factors for renal involvement such as older age and higher level of uric acid were only found in the child group. The risk factors for poor renal outcome were nephrotic syndrome in the child group and gross hematuria in the adult group. Conclusion: In this study, child and adult groups presented with different clinical manifestations of HSP. We found that risk factors for renal involvement included age and high uric acid level in the child group. Moreover, nephrotic syndrome in the child group and gross hematuria in the adult group increased the risk of poor renal outcome.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.51 no.5
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• pp.227-233
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• 2018

Objectives: Chronic diseases, including back pain, result in significant patient morbidity and societal burden. Overall improvement in physical fitness is recommended for prevention and treatment. Walking is a convenient modality for achieving initial gains. Our objective was to determine whether neighbourhood walkability, acting as a surrogate measure of physical fitness, was associated with the presence of chronic disease. Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional study of prospectively collected data from a prior randomized cohort study of 227 patients referred for tertiary assessment of chronic back pain in Ottawa, ON, Canada. The Charlson Comorbidity Index (CCI) was calculated from patient-completed questionnaires and medical record review. Using patients' postal codes, neighbourhood walkability was determined using the Walk Score, which awards points based on the distance to the closest amenities, yielding a score from 0 to 100 (0-50: car-dependent; 50-100: walkable). Results: Based on the Walk Score, 134 patients lived in car-dependent neighborhoods and 93 lived in walkable neighborhoods. A multivariate logistic regression model, adjusted for age, gender, rural postal code, body mass index, smoking, median household income, percent employment, pain, and disability, demonstrated an adjusted odds ratio of 2.75 (95% confidence interval, 1.16 to 6.53) times higher prevalence for having a chronic disease for patients living in a car-dependent neighborhood. There was also a significant dose-related association (p=0.01; Mantel-Haenszel chi-square=6.4) between living in car-dependent neighbourhoods and more severe CCI scores. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that advocating for improved neighbourhood planning to permit greater walkability may help offset the burden of chronic disease.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.46 no.4
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• pp.289-291
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• 2008

The Tamjin River which flows from Jangheung-gun via Gangjin-gun to the South Sea was reported to be a highly endemic area of Metagonimus yokogawai infection in 1977 and 1985. However, there were no recent studies demonstrating how much change occurred in the endemicity, in terms of prevalence and worm burden, of metagonimiasis in this river basin. Thus, a small-scale epidemiological survey was carried out on some residents along the Tamjin River basin in order to determine the current status of M. yokogawai infection. A total of 48 fecal samples were collected and examined by the Kato-Katz thick smear and formalin-ether sedimentation techniques. The egg positive rate of all helminths was 50.0%, and that of M. yokogawai was 37.5%, followed by C. sinensis 22.9% and G. seoi 4.2%. To obtain the adult flukes of M. yokogawai, 6 egg positive cases were treated with praziquantel 10 mg/kg in a single dose and purged with magnesium sulfate. A total of 5,225 adult flukes (average 871 specimens per person) of M. yokogawai were collected from their diarrheic stools. Compared with the data reported in 1977 and 1985, the individual worm burdens appeared to have decreased remarkably, although the prevalence did not decrease at all. It is suggested that the endemicity of M. yokogawai infection along the Tamjin River has been reduced. To confirm this suggestion, the status of infection in snail and fish intermediate hosts should be investigated.

• Journal of the Korean Dietetic Association
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.202-213
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• 2017

The purpose of this study was to provide basic data for the development of medicinal herbs, which are useful for the treatment of chronic diseases and physical characteristics of the elderly. A total of 151 adult women aged 65 years or older currently living in Daejeon were enrolled. The contents of this study were parents' health status, recognition of the necessity for a dietary therapy, awareness of medicinal herbs, requirements for medicinal herbs, physician of medicinal herbs and obstacles to medicinal herbs. Based on these results, the differences in the perception of medicinal herbs according to the dietary needs group as well as differences in the perception of medicinal herbs according to medicinal herbicidal groups were analyzed. Of the 151 subjects, 90.7% were married, and 44.4% of them were aged between 40 and 49. Most of the patients were aged in their 70s (68.9%), and 79.5% of had chronic illnesses such as high blood pressure, hyperlipidemia, arteriosclerosis, and heart disease. It is recognized that dietary therapy is necessary for the treatment of diseases, and awareness of medicinal herbs is low but necessary. As for the requirements for medicinal herbs, the most favored was 'porridge for the prevention and treatment of diseases', and 72.2% of medicinal herbs were physicians. However, problems cited were availabitity of ingredients, cooking technique, price of ingredients, and others. In addition, both groups requiring dietary therapy and having high awareness of medicinal herbs felt that medicinal herbs would be helpful in treating diseases. Therefore, it is necessary to provide a simple medicinal herb recipe for each disease and to develop anti cooked medicinal herbs.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.40-47
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• 1999

Objectives. The health examination survey was conducted in order to estimate the prevalence of major chronic diseases in a community Methods. A multi-stage stratified probability sample of 1,656 persons, aged from 20 to 69 years, was drawn out from Kuri City. All sampled persons were personally informed of the purpose, content and procedures of the survey and mobile examination center was run between 6 AM and 9 PM for the convenience of the participants. Results. 854 persons (339 males and 515 females) completed this survey with a response rate of 53.4%. Prevalent diseases in male were hypertension(19.0%), HBs Ag carrier(9.8%), impaired glucose tolerance(8.7%), diabetes mellitus(6.3%), hypercholesterolemia(3.4%), anemia(2.7%) and degenerative arthritis(2.6%) in order of prevalence rate. Prevalent diseases in female were osteoporosis(22.5%), impaired glucose tolerance(17.3%), anemia(12.8%), hypertension(12.4%), degenerative arthritis (6.6%), HBs Ag carrier(5.8%), diabetes mellitus(5.4%) and hypercholesterolemia(3.5%) in order of prevalence rate. Conclusions. This results suggest that hypertension was most prevalent in adult male whereas diabetes mellitus including IGT, osteoporosis were most prevalent in adult female, in Kuri City.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.219-227
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• 2014

Background: Current trends in Korea population aging with advances in public health and clinical medicine foretell rises in the prevalence of not only chronic diseases but also patients with multimorbidity. One important aspect in analyzing multimorbidity is to define the list of chronic diseases included when calculating multimorbidity index. The objective of this study is to describing the effect of multimorbidity on healthcare cost in Korea using US Office of the Assistant Secretary of Health (OASH) list. Methods: We analyzed the Korea Health Panel Data representing non-institutionalized Korean adult populations aged 20 and more. We calculated multimorbidity index based on OASH list and estimated the prevalence and healthcare cost for each OASH chronic disease. Results: In 2011, 15.2 million (39.6%) Koreans aged 20 and more were living with chronic condition. The health care cost due to chronic diseases, accounted for 80.2% of the overall healthcare costs and the prevalence of chronic conditions, the prevalence of multimorbidity and healthcare cost increased with ages. In the analysis using OASH list, 40% of the adult population over the age of 20 and 66.7% of the population over the age of 65 was affected with multimorbidity. In most of diseases in OASH list, prevalence of mulitmorbidity was high and healthcare cost increased with multimorbidity. Conclusion: OASH chronic disease list that accounts for 72.4% of prevalence and 86.7% of healthcare cost of persons with chronic conditions in Korea. OASH chronic disease list would be a useful and representative indicator for studying multimorbidity.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.57 no.4
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• pp.451-456
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• 2019

Adult specimens of Echinochasmus caninus n. comb. (Verma, 1935) (Trematoda: Echinostomatidae) (syn. Episthmium caninum Yamaguti, 1958) were recovered from 11 riparian people who resided along the Mekong River in Khammouane Province, Lao PDR. In fecal examinations done by the Kato-Katz technique, the cases revealed eggs of Opisthorchis viverrini/minute intestinal flukes, hookworms, and in 2 cases echinostome eggs. To recover the adult helminths, praziquantel 30-40 mg/kg and pyrantel pamoate 10-15 mg/kg in a single dose were given and purged with magnesium salts. Various species of trematodes (including O. viverrini and Haplorchis spp.), cestodes, and nematodes were recovered from their diarrheic stools. Among the trematodes, small echinostome flukes (n=42; av. 3.8 specimens per case) of 0.7-1.2 mm in length are subjected in this study. They are morphologically characterized by having 24 collar spines interrupted dorsally and anterior extension of vitellaria from the cirrus sac or genital pore level to the posterior end of the body. Particularly based on this extensive distribution of vitellaria, the specific diagnosis was made as Echinochasmus caninus. The cases were co-infected with various other helminth parasites; thus, clinical manifestations specific for this echinostome infection were difficult to determine. The present paper describes for the first time human E. caninus infections in Lao PDR. Our cases marked the 4-14th human infections with this echinostome around the world following the 3 previous cases reported from Thailand.