• Physical Therapy Korea
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.61-81
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• 2002

The purposes of this research were to investigate home care rehabilitation services in rural areas and to collect basic data about disabled persons necessary when for carrying out rehabilitation services. Respondents were selected from six of a total of eight townships (Myon) and one town (Eup) in the Wonju city area. Wonju is in Kangwon Province (Do). Of a total of 338 names provided by the Myon offices, 298 persons were located and included registered and non-registered persons. Conditions included stroke, spinal cord injury, and cerebral palsy in addition to disabilities classified as first, second or third degree, in the case of registered cases. Respondent demographic characteristics, medical characteristics, rehabilitation service needs, willingness to receive rehabilitation service and individual opinions regarding rehabilitation services were analysed by frequency and percentage. The results were as follows: 1) Rehabilitation services received by disabled persons living at home in the rural areas surrounding Wonju city were medical rehabilitation (41.7%), diagnosis (36.5%), rehabilitation assistive devices (7.6%), social assistance (7.1%), rehabilitation counseling (3.0%), vocational rehabilitation (1.8%), educational rehabilitation (1.6%) and housekeeping services (0.5%). The majority of rehabilitation services were medical rehabilitation provided at hospitals and oriental medicine hospitals. 2) Sixty point eight percent of respondents expressed their willingness to receive home care rehabilitation services. Needs expressed were highest for medical rehabilitation (27.0%), followed by social assistance (19.4%), medical examination (12.4%), physician-generated diagnosis in the home setting (11.6%), sociopsychological rehabilitation (9.3%), vocational rehabilitation (7.6%), rehabilitation engineering (6.0%), educational rehabilitation (3.3%), and housekeeping services (3.3%). 3) Rehabilitation service needs were analyzed by severity classification: 65.8% of first degree, 62.7% of second degree and 55.6% of third degree disability classification, and 62.7% of non-registered disabled individuals responded that rehabilitation service was necessary. 4) Rehabilitation service needs were also analyzed by diagnosis: 62.6% of stroke, 85.5% of amputation, 60.0% of spinal cord injury and 52.4% of traumatic brain injury respondents answered positively that they were willing to receive rehabilitation service if it were to be provided. Rehabilitation service utilization data of disabled individuals living at home in rural areas were investigated and their rehabilitation needs analyzed. This critical information can be used when community-based rehabilitation programs for disabled persons living at home are planned for provision out of a public health center or when community-based rehabilitation welfare policy is formulated.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.61 no.3
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• pp.29-54
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• 2009

This study is intended to figure out determinants affecting the economic preparations for old age of pastors from major four protestant associations having a church ministerial pension system: the General Assembly of Presbyterian Church in Korea (GAPCK), the Presbyterian Church of Korea (PCK), the Presbyterian Church in the Republic of Korea (PROK), and the Korean Methodist Church (KMC). Thereby, it conducted a survey to 452 pastors from the four religious associations in Korea. The followings sum up the results of this research. First, it was shown that the conventional idea that there is no need for pastors to prepare for their old age or their preparations for old age imply disbelief had been diminished. Second, there were few pastors who had made economic preparations for their old age privately. Third, associations adopting a compulsory church ministerial pension system were PCK, PROK, and KMC indicating a high occupation of more than 75% whereas GAPCK with an optional system showed a very low percentage of 11.5%. Fourth, with regard to the national pension system, the associations except for PROK (61.8%) had more non-enrolled pastors (53.3%), and they responded economic difficulty as the biggest reason for the unenrollment. Fourth, determinants affecting their economic preparations for old age were academic career, total income, church independency, church reserving, and national pension enrollment. Fifth, among the pastors from the four associations, the ones of PROK prepared for their old age best in consideration of GAPCK. According to the results of this paper, the most critical determinant affecting pastors' economic preparations for old age was total income. Pastors with higher income can make church ministerial pension, national pension, and private preparations while the ones with lower income cannot afford for public as well as private preparations; that is, there exists a polarization phenomenon in pastors' economic preparations for old age. Therefore, it is necessary to make devices to narrow the income gap between pastors in religious associations. Second, even in the associations having a compulsory church ministerial pension system, many pastors were not insured, so it is needed to reform or improve the pension system. Third, it is also required to better the national pension system and change the recognition on it.

• Environmental Analysis Health and Toxicology
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• v.31
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• pp.19.1-19.7
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• 2016

A large portion of the Korean population has been exposed to toxic humidifier disinfectants (HDs), and considering that the majority of the victims are infants, the magnitude of the damage is expected to be considerably larger than what has currently been revealed. The current victims are voicing problems caused by various diseases, including but not limited to lung, upper respiratory tract, cardiovascular, kidney, musculoskeletal, eye, and skin diseases, etc. However, there has been difficulty in gaining validation for these health problems and identifying causal relationships due to lack of evidence proving that toxic HD is the specific causes of extrapulmonary diseases such as allergic rhinitis. Furthermore, the victims and bereaved families of the HD case have not received any support for psychological distress such as post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, feelings of injustice, and anger caused by the trauma. In addition, because the underlying mechanisms of the toxic materials within the HDs such as polyhexamethylene guanidine phosphate, poly(oxyalkylene guanidine) hydrochloride, chloromethylisothiazolinone /methylisothiazolinone have yet to be determined, the demand for information regarding the HD issue is growing. The victims of the HD cases require support that goes beyond financial aid for medical costs and living expenses. There is a desperate need for government-led integrated support centers that provide individualized support through health screenings; in other words, we need an integrated facility that provides the appropriate social support to allow the victims to recover their physical and mental health, so as to well prepare them to return to a normal life. The implementation of such a plan requires not only the close cooperation between those departments already directly involved such as the Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Health and Welfare, but also active support on a national scale from pan-governmental consultative bodies.

• The Journal of Internal Korean Medicine
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• v.39 no.4
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• pp.662-675
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• 2018

Objective: The aim of this study was to establish the developmental history of hospice palliative care (HPC) with Korean medicine (KM). Methods: We compared the developmental history of HPC in Korea with that of Britain, the United States, Taiwan, Japan, and China. The articles in English or Korean published until Feb. 2017 were searched using 'Hospice' or 'Palliative care' with the name of each nation in the PubMed, MEDLINE, ScienceDirect, and CINAHL (Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature) databases for foreign articles and OASIS (Oriental Medicine Advanced Searching Integrated System) for domestic articles. Books and gray literature were searched on the same databases and websites of the Ministry of Health and Welfare and related organizations in each country. Results: Modern palliative care began with the hospice movement led by Dr. Cicely Saunders. HPC in Korea started earlier than in other countries but it took considerable time for social consensus, so Korean policies have only been published recently. In this process, KM was excluded from HPC. For this reason, western medicine in Korea does not fully accept the spirit of HPC, the government does not take an aggressive stance with KM, and the institutes of KM do not have any interest in HPC. The World Health Organization recommends the establishment of policies and programs connected with a country's own health care system. In 2015, the Korean government made the third comprehensive plan for the development of KM. It included critical pathway guidelines about cancer-related fatigue and anorexia. More effort is required to set up HPC than other care types because Korea has two medical systems. Conclusions: Each nation has been trying to improve systems of HPC. We need to overcome the problems and bring out the best by making our own model of HPC with KM.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.12 no.5
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• pp.272-279
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• 2012

This study aims to analyze the factors that affect quality of life and sensory processing abilities in older adults. Participants were 121 older adults aged over 65. Quality of life was evaluated with Life satisfaction Index for the Elderly and sensory processing abilities were measured with Korean-AASP. Korean Activiy Card Sort was utilized to assess their activity level. Low positive correlations were found between quality of life and activity level in total score(p<.01), IADL(p<.05), leisure(p<.01), and social participation(p<.01). Correlation coefficients between quality of life and sensory processing abilities showed low negative correlations in low registration(p<.01), sensory sensitivity(p<.01), and sensation avoiding(p<.01), however, there were low positive correlations in sensation seeking(p<.05). The importance of sensory processing was highlighted from the findings of statistically significant correlations between quality of life and sensory processing abilities. This indicates that improvement of sensory processing abilities is critical in occupational therapy service for older adults. Furthermore, the findings of close relationship between activity levels and sensory processing abilities need to be reflected in senior welfare policy.

• 한국노년학
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• v.40 no.2
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• pp.325-340
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• 2020

Early diagnosis and intervention of dementia is critical to minimize future risk and cost for patients and their families. The purpose of this study was to develop and validate Figure-Copy Test(FCT), as a new dementia screening test, that can measure neurological damage and cognitive impairment, and then to examine whether the grading precesses for screening can be automated through machine learning procedure by using FCT imag es. For this end, FCT, Korean version of MMSE for Dementia Screening (MMSE-DS) and Clock Drawing Test were administrated to a total of 270 participants from normal and damaged elderly groups. Results demonstrated that FCT scores showed high internal constancy and significant correlation coefficients with the other two test scores. Discriminant analyses showed that the accuracy of classification for the normal and damag ed g roups using FCT were 90.8% and 77.1%, respectively, and these were relatively higher than the other two tests. Importantly, we identified that the participants whose MMSE-DS scores were higher than the cutoff but showed lower scores in FCT were successfully screened out through clinical diagnosis. Finally, machine learning using the FCT image data showed an accuracy of 73.70%. In conclusion, our results suggest that FCT, a newly developed drawing test, can be easily implemented for efficient dementia screening.