• Journal of Yeungnam Medical Science
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.95-102
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• 1985

This report offers descriptive data about the drugs utilized in out patient department (OPD) of Yeungnam University Hospital (YUH) in the period of march to august in 1985. The data in this report were produced by the computerized totalization of the number of mentions of individual drugs included in the prescriptions. The 100 drug entries that were most frequently recorded are listed in rank order. The listing is arbiturarily restricted to the drugs that were prescribed as single preparations, the drugs of basis of compound preparations and the drugs of adjuvent or corrective of compound preparations that have significant therapeutic effects either by generic names. And in addition, the listing also involves the compound preparations used in relatively large frequency, and the individual components of which have the unique pharmacological actions each other by proprietary names. And all routes of administrations were allowed. The 10 drugs most frequently named are diazepam, aluminum compounds, acetaminophen, isoniazid, metoclopramide, $polaramine^{(R)}$, carboxymethylcystem, ephedrine, codeine and caroverine in order. The 521,855 drug mentions listed as above are described by the chief therapeutic usage that each is intended to apply generally. The drugs which account the largest proportion of total mentions were those acting on the central nervous system (20.57%), including tranquilhzers and sedative hypnotics (11.71%), analgesic antipyretics (5.55%), antidepressants (2.15%) etc. Gastrointestinal drugs and smooth muscle preparations (18.64%) included antacids and anti-ulcer drugs (9.24%), antiemetics (3.57%), spasmolytics (3.14%) and others. Respiratory drugs (16.11%) included expectorants and cough preparations (10.99%) and bronchodilators (5.12%). Chemotherapeutic agents (15.12%) included the antiTbc drugs (7.09%) most frequently, and the penicillins (3.33%) accounted the largest proportion among the antibiotics. Cardiovascular drugs (5.64%) included cardiac drugs and coronary vasodilator (4.12%) and antihypertensives and vasodilators (1.06%). And anti-inflammatory drugs (4.33%), vitamins of single preparations (3.76%), hormones and their antagonists (3.29%), common cold preparations (3.12%), diuretics (2.81%), drugs supporting liver function (2.02%), drugs affecting autonomic nervous system(1.89%) including anti-glaucomas, atropine and cerebral vasodilators, antihistamine drugs (1.02%) and disinfectants (0.74%) were following in order. The data in this report were compared to those reported by H. Koch, et al. in United States (US), 1981 as "Drugs Most Frequently Used in Office Practice:National Ambulatory Medical Case Survey, 1981." Cardiovascular drugs prescribed in YUH were much less in proportion than in US (10.56%), but gastrointestinal drugs accounted the larger proportion than in US (3.72%). Expectorants and cough preparations in YUH also accounted the larger proportion than in US (2.74%). In conclusion, in the period of march to august, 1985, OPD of YUH prescribed the CNS drugs including diazepam most frequently, and gastrointestinal, repiratory and chemotherapeutic drugs in next orders. It is supposed that the eating habits of Koreans and a unique atmospheric condition in Taegu as a basin were some important factors that affected the proportions of drugs acting on gastrointestinal and respiratory tracts.

• Journal of Haehwa Medicine
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.445-448
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• 1995

Although significant progress has been made during the past four decades in the treatment of human neoplastic disease, effective chemotherapeutic treatments are nevertheless far from satisfactory to patients suffering from cancer, particularly to those with the stomach cancer which is most prevalent in Korea. To find out the effective anticancer drugs, especially human stomach cancer, we tested cytotoxic activities of several medicinal herbs against human stomach cancer cell line, SNU-1. Evodia officinalis, Melia toosendan, Sinomenium acutum, Galla Haeepensis, Celastrus orbiculatus and Taxus caespitosa showed a significant cytotoxic activities.

• Plant Resources
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• v.4 no.3
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• pp.192-195
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• 2001

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the causative agent of AIDS, still continues to spread rapidly in the world population, especially in Africa and Southeast Asia. At present, two kinds of therapeutic approaches are used for treatment of AIDS. One is to target HIV reverse transcriptase, which is responsible for the viral genome transcription. The other is to inhibit HIV pretense PR, which is essential for the processing of viral proteins. Drug combinations based on these approaches can reduce the blood virus to an undetectable level. However, a small amount of virus may lurk inside the immune cells in a dormant state. Another major obstacle of long-term treatment of the disease is remarkable mutation in HIV. Most of the clinical chemotherapeutic agents have one or more of these problems. High cost and harmful side-effects further reduced the desirability of these drugs. In the course our studies on development of anti-HIV agents from natural products, we investigated various crude drugs for their inhibitory activity against HIV-induced cytopathic effects (CPE) in culture cells, HIV-pretense (PR), HIV-reverse transcriptase (RT) including ribonuclease H (RNase H), and HIV integrase (INT). In the present paper, some inhibitory substances relating to the development of anti-HIV agents are reported.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.28 no.11
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• pp.1910-1916
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• 2007

Analyzed are recent advances in design of novel boronared conjugates of synthetic and natural porphyrins and chlorins. These compounds showed high efficacy as cytotoxic agents for tumor cells in culture and as phototoxins in photodynamic therapy of tumor xenografts. Thus, boronated porphyrins and chlorins emerge as promising class of anticancer agents with potentially multiple advantages: the chemotherapeutic drugs alone and photo- and radiosensitizers in binary treatments.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.5
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• pp.2611-2617
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• 2016

Background: Medication errors are common but most often preventable events in any health care setup. Studies on medication errors involving chemotherapeutic drugs are limited. Objective: We studied three aspects of medication errors - prescription, transcription and administration errors in 500 cancer patients who received ambulatory cancer chemotherapy at a resource limited setting government hospital attached cancer centre in South India. The frequency of medication errors, their types and the possible reasons for their occurrence were analysed. Design and Methods: Cross-sectional study using direct observation and chart review in anmbulatory day care unit of a Regional Cancer Centre in South India. Prescription charts of 500 patients during a three month time period were studied and errors analysed. Transcription errors were estimated from the nurses records for these 500 patients who were prescribed anticancer medications or premedication to be administered in the day care centre, direct observations were made during drug administration and administration errors analysed. Medical oncologists prescribing anticancer medications and nurses administering medications also participated. Results: A total of 500 patient observations were made and 41.6% medication errors were detected. Among the total observed errors, 114 (54.8%) were prescription errors, 51(24.5%) were transcribing errors and 43 (20.7%) were administration errors. The majority of the prescription errors were due to missing information (45.5%) and administration errors were mainly due to errors in drug reconstitution (55.8%). There were no life threatening events during the observation period since most of the errors were either intercepted before reaching the patient or were trivial. Conclusions: A high rate of potentially harmful medication errors were intercepted at the ambulatory day care unit of our regional cancer centre. Suggestions have been made to reduce errors in the future by adoption of computerised prescriptions and periodic sensitisation of the responsible health personnel.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.16 no.7
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• pp.2807-2811
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• 2015

Scorpion venom peptides recently have attracted attention as alternative chemotherapeutic agents that may overcome the limitations of current drugs, providing specific cytotoxicity for cancer cells with an ability to bypass multidrug-resistance mechanisms, additive effects in combination therapy and safety. In the present study, BmKn-2 scorpion venom peptide and its derivatives were chosen for assessment of anticancer activities. BmKn-2 was identified as the most effective against human oral squamous cells carcinoma cell line (HSC-4) by screening assays with an $IC_{50}$ value of $29{\mu}g/ml$. The BmKn-2 peptide killed HSC-4 cells through induction of apoptosis, as confirmed by phase contrast microscopy and RT-PCR techniques. Typical morphological features of apoptosis including cell shrinkage and rounding characteristics were observed in treated HSC-4 cells. The results were further confirmed by increased expression of pro-apoptotic genes such as caspase-3, -7, and -9 but decrease mRNA level of anti-apoptotic BCL-2 in BmKn-2 treated cells, as determined by RT-PCR assay. In summary, the BmKn-2 scorpion venom peptide demonstrates specific membrane binding, growth inhibition and apoptogenic activity against human oral cancer cells.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.1637-1641
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• 2016

Oxaliplatin, a third generation novel platinum compound is the most effective first line chemotherapeutic agent for colorectal cancer (CRC) in combination with 5FU and leucovorin. It is indicated for pancreatic, gastric and testicular cancers combined with bevacuzimab, capecitabine, irinotecan and other cytotoxic agents. However, moderate to severe hypersensitivity reactions (HSR) during or after oxaliplatin infusion usually require cessation of chemotherapy or substitution of the key therapeutic drug which largely interferes with improved patient prognosis. This mini- review showcases recent and accepted opinions/approaches in oxaliplatin induced HSR management. Physicians and oncologists have varying attitudes regarding the decision to rechallenge the patient after an HSR experience, efficacy of desensitization protocols, effectiveness and selection of drugs for premedication and possibilities of cross sensitivity to other platinum agents (e.g. carboplatin). A brief insight into underlying molecular mechanisms and clinical manifestations of oxaliplatin induced HSR is offered. We have also discussed the management of oxaliplatin induced HSR and risk stratification for a successful and complete chemotherapeutic plan.

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.293-301
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• 2019

Combination chemotherapy is more effective than mono-chemotherapy and is widely used in clinical practice for enhanced cancer treatment. In this study, we investigated the potential synergistic effects of acetaminophen, a common component in many cold medicines, and romidepsin, a histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitor, in the A549 non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) cell line. The combination of acetaminophen and romidepsin also exerted significant cytotoxicity and apoptosis induced by activation of caspase-3 on tumor cells in vitro. Moreover, combination therapy significantly induced increased production of chemokines that stimulate migration of activated T-cells into tumor cells. This mechanism can lead to active T-cell mediated anti-tumor immunity in addition to the direct cytotoxic chemotherapeutic effect. Activated T-cells led to enhanced cytotoxicity in drug-treated A549 cells through interaction with tumor cells. These results suggested that the interaction between the two drugs is synergistic and significant. In conclusion, our data showed that the use of romidepsin and low concentrations acetaminophen could induce effective anti-tumor effects via enhanced tumor immune and direct cytotoxic chemotherapeutic responses. The combination of acetaminophen with romidepsin should be considered as a promising strategy for the treatment of lung cancer.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Information and Commucation Sciences Conference
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• 2017.10a
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• pp.470-472
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• 2017

Currently, various studies using chemotherapy, such as surgical treatment, radiation or optical therapy, and chemotherapy, are underway. In addition, expensive chemotherapeutic drugs and large-scale equipment have been developed to improve the accuracy and therapeutic effect. However many side effects caused by misuse of the kind of light source, radiation, and cancer treatment have been observed. Therefore, in this paper, we propose a novel chemotherapeutic method by developing a customized cancer cell proliferation inhibition module based on a microcontroller that is relatively inexpensive, easy to operate, and able to operate in various wavelength light sources.

• Nutrition Research and Practice
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.95-101
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• 2020

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: Folate plays a critical role in DNA synthesis and methylation. Intracellular folate homeostasis is maintained by the enzymes folylpolyglutamate synthase (FPGS) and γ-glutamyl hydrolase (GGH). FPGS adds glutamate residues to folate upon its entry into the cell through a process known as polyglutamylation to enhance folate retention in the cell and to maintain a steady supply of utilizable folate derivatives for folate-dependent enzyme reactions. Thereafter, GGH catalyzes the hydrolysis of polyglutamylated folate into monoglutamylated folate, which can subsequently be exported from the cell. The objective of this review is to summarize the scientific evidence available on the effects of intracellular folate homeostasis-associated enzymes on cancer chemotherapy. METHODS: This review discusses the effects of FPGS and GGH on chemosensitivity to cancer chemotherapeutic agents such as antifolates, such as methotrexate, and 5-fluorouracil. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: Polyglutamylated (anti)folates are better substrates for intracellular folate-dependent enzymes and retained for longer within cells. In addition to polyglutamylation of (anti)folates, FPGS and GGH modulate intracellular folate concentrations, which are an important determinant of chemosensitivity of cancer cells toward chemotherapeutic agents. Therefore, FPGS and GGH affect chemosensitivity to antifolates and 5-fluorouracil by altering intracellular retention status of antifolates and folate cofactors such as 5,10-methylenetetrahydrofolate, subsequently influencing the cytotoxic effects of 5-fluorouracil, respectively. Generally, high FPGS and/or low GGH activity is associated with increased chemosensitivity of cancer cells to methotrexate and 5-fluorouracil, while low FPGS and/or high GGH activity seems to correspond to resistance to these drugs. Further preclinical and clinical studies elucidating the pharmocogenetic ramifications of these enzyme-induced changes are warranted to provide a framework for developing rational, effective, safe, and customized chemotherapeutic practices.