• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.332-345
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• 2023

Objectives: We examined the association of hearing with cardio-metabolic diseases, dyslipidemia, hypertension and diabetes mellitus according to the personal and occupational characteristics of workers exposed to noise. Methods: The subjects of the study were 237,028 workers who underwent 2, 3, and 4 kHz airway pure tone audiometry in 2015 and who underwent clinical tests to diagnose cardiovascular-metabolic diseases. Cardiovascular-metabolic diseases were defined using reference values for respective items including blood pressure (systolic/diastolic), fasting blood glucose, cholesterol, and triglycerides. The airway pure tone hearing threshold of 2, 3, and 4 kHz, the average threshold of 2-3-4 kHz, and the hearing loss by the average threshold of the primary examination were distinguished. Results: Workers with cardiovascular-metabolic disease had significantly higher average hearing thresholds and higher rates of hearing loss. Logistic regression analysis, which adjusted for demographic variables of gender and age and occupational variables such as workplace size, industry, and type of work, and cardiovascular-metabolic disease as independent variables, showed that the odds ratio of hypertension to hearing loss in the mid-frequency was 1.239 (95% confidence interval: 1.118-1.374). For hypertension was 1.159 (1.107-1.214) and for diabetes it was 1.166 (1.104-1.230) for hearing loss in the high-frequency. Hearing loss measured by mean hearing was 1.178 (1.105-1.256) for hypertension and 1.181 (1.097-1.271) for diabetes. Conclusions: Cardiovascular-metabolic diseases in noise-exposed workers are associated with an increased risk of hearing loss and should be accompanied by bio-monitoring of cardiovascular-metabolic diseases in addition to auditory surveillance.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.18 no.11
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• pp.433-444
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• 2017

This study was conducted to identify relationships between lung function disorders and Metabolic Syndrome(MetS) that have common comorbidities such as Cardio Vascular Diseases(CVD). According to the hypothesis that there may be a significant relationship between them, analyses were conducted to identify the proper management point for those diseases. Overall, 53,829 data were taken from KNHANES 2008-2013. Included data were PFT(Pulmonary Function Test) done and age over 40. All the 14 confounders applied, only 8,137 cases (M:3,951, F:4,186) were left. Low pulmonary function was divided into two categories, obstructive and restrictive patterns, based on the Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease(GOLD) criteria, while MetS was defined based on the revised NCEP-ATPIII criteria. The relationships between those diseases were analyzed using logistic regression analysis. In addition, for the prevalence rate, cross-tab analysis were conducted. There were no significant relationships observed between obstructive lung disease and MetS, but a restrictive pattern had a meaningful relationship with MetS. Specifically, MetS showed a higher prevalence rate for both obstructive and restrictive pattern patients than the control group. Restrictive pattern patients showed a higher prevalence rate to MetS than obstructive patients. Overall, restrictive lung patterns showed a meaningful association with MetS, but not with obstructive patterns. Additionally, the prevalence rate of MetS among restrictive patients was higher than among obstructive patients.

• Journal of Korea Society of Digital Industry and Information Management
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.69-81
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• 2010

Physical manifestations of aging due to the lack of exercise include the slowing down of motor learning, cardiopulmonary degradation, and the increasing difficulty to adapt to the environment. Aging is manifested with the lack of aerobic exercise work, decrease in muscular endurance, decline in skeletal and muscular strength, flexibility and agility, and the decrease in reaction speed and balance. Added to those are aging-related physiological changes, including the reduction of muscle bulk, increased body fat, decrease in total body water and basic metabolic rate as activities are reduced, and a decrease in cell and Lean Body Mass (LBM). These changes are known to cause problems. Interest and participation in appropriate physical activities among the elderly is needed to help them increase stamina, avoid diseases, maintain a clear intellect, and basically enable the elderly to live their daily lives as easy as possible. Therefore, physical activities are necessary for the elderly to enhance health-related factors. Special exercises should be performed for the enhancement of muscle function, muscle endurance, flexibility, agility, and balance. An accurate measurement of cardio-respiratory endurance and stamina through basic physical and cognitive characteristics of older adults is also required to ensure safety. Also, the development of a more scientific resistance exercise prescription system for the elderly is desperately needed.

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.15-22
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• 2015

Dexamethasone, a synthetic glucocorticoid (GC), is clinically administered to woman at risk for premature labor to induce fetal lung maturation. However, exposure to repeated or excess GCs leads to intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR) and subsequently increases risk of psychiatric and cardio-metabolic diseases in later life through fetal programming mechanisms. GCs are key mediators of stress responses, therefore, maternal nutrient restriction or psychological stress during pregnancy also causes negative impacts on birth and neurodevelopment outcome of fetuses, and other congenital defects, such as craniofacial and skeletal abnormalities. In this study, to examine the effect of prenatal stress on fetal skeletal development, dexamethasone (1 mg/kg [DEX1] or 10 mg/kg [DEX10] maternal body weight per day) was administered intraperitoneally at gestational day 7.5~9.5 and the skeletons were prepared from embryos at day 18.5. Seven out of eighteen (39%) embryos treated with DEX10 showed axial skeletal abnormalities in either the T13 or L1 vertebrae. In addition, examination of the sternum revealed that xiphoid process, the protrusive triangular part of the lower end of the sternum, was bent more outward or inward in DEX group embryos. In conclusion, our findings suggest a possible link to the understanding of the effect of uterine environment to the fetal skeletal features.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.27-36
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• 2013

Objectives: Mental health has been shown to be linked with certain underlying physiological mechanisms. The objective of this cross sectional study was to investigate the relationship between depressive symptoms and brachial artery reactivity (BAR) in an understudied population: police officers. Methods: Participants were 351 police officers who were clinically examined in the Buffalo Cardio-Metabolic Police Stress (BCOPS) study. BAR was performed using standard B-Mode ultrasound procedures. Depressive symptoms were measured using the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression (CES-D) scale. Mean values of the difference between the baseline and maximum diameters of the brachial artery were determined across three categories of CES-D score using the analysis of variance and the analysis of covariance. p-values for linear trends were obtained from linear regression models. Results: The mean age (${\pm}$ standard deviation) of all officers was $40.9{\pm}7.2$ years. Women had a slightly higher mean CES-D score than men ($8.9{\pm}8.9$ vs. $7.4{\pm}6.4$) and a slightly higher percentage increase of BAR than men (6.90 vs. 5.26%). Smoking status significantly modified the associations between depressive symptoms and BAR. Among current smokers, mean absolute values of BAR significantly decreased as depressive symptoms increased after adjustment for age, gender, race/ethnicity, hypertension, and diabetes; the multivariate-adjusted p-values were 0.033 (absolute) and 0.040 (%). Associations between depressive symptoms and BAR were not statistically significant among former smokers or never smokers. Conclusion: Depressive symptoms were inversely associated with BAR among police officers who were current smokers and together may be considered a risk factor for cardiovascular disease among police officers. Further prospective research is warranted.

• Korean Journal of Psychosomatic Medicine
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.36-41
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• 2020

Objectives : Clozapine has been known to increase the possibility of developing cardio/cerebrovascular diseases, and the platelet activation has been deemed to be related to the occurrence of them. In author's previous study, we observed the increase of platelet activity with short-term clozapine administration. This study was conducted, as a follow-up study, to investigate the effect of clozapine on the platelet activity when administered continuously for long-term period of time of 1 year. Methods : The medical records of the patients with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder who were treated with clozapine for 1 year were retrospectively reviewed. The degree of platelet activation was assessed by measuring the mean platelet component. Results : Total of 24 patients were enrolled. 9 of them (37.5%) were male and 15 of them (62.5%) were female. In the Wilcoxon sign-ranks test, no significant change was observed between the mean platelet factor values at the beginning and at the end of one year. Conclusions : No significant changes of mean platelet activity were observed after continued administration of clozapine for 1 year. Considering the author's previous findings that observed a prominent decrease of mean platelet component after short-term clozapine administration, the result of this study suggests the possibility that the activity of the platelet may change depending on the duration of the clozapine administration.