• Korean Journal of Psychosomatic Medicine
• /
• v.8 no.1
• /
• pp.3-10
• /
• 2000

Objectives : The author wanted to summarize the psychiatric and social aspects of the patients with hepatitis B virus infection. Methods : The author reviewed all pertinent citations in the Medline database from 1966 to 1999. Results : Psychiatric problems in this population include delirium, psychotic disorder due to general medical condition(especially mania), anxiety, depression, adjustment disorder, alcohol abuse/dependence, and drug abuse/dependence. Social aspects of the patients with hepatitis B viral infection relate to the stigma of being a carrier, guilty feeling about infection, guilty feeling about increased family burden, impacts of having hepatitis on interpersonal relations, sexual difficulties, and job loss with increased financial burden, and health care worker's refusal. Conclusions : Appropriate early educational counseling interventions regarding the expected course and psychosocial intervention should be tailored to the sociocultural needs of special populations. Those interventions will increase compliance of treatment and prevent progression to hepatocellalar carcinoma from hepatitis.

• Korean Journal of Psychosomatic Medicine
• /
• v.20 no.1
• /
• pp.32-39
• /
• 2012

Objective : Psychiatry in North Korea is believed to seem very different from psychiatry in South Korea. However, there is nearly no information regarding psychiatry in North Korea until now. Our study aimed to get information about North Korean psychiatry. Methods : Three North Korean defectors in South Korea, whose clinical experience as medical doctors in North Korea was over 10 years, were recruited. They underwent the semi-structured interview, content of which included the clinical experience with psychiatric patients, the details of psychiatry, the treatment of psychiatric patients, the stigma of mental illness, and the suicide, in North Korea. Results : In North Korea, psychiatric department was called as 49th(pronounced as Sahsip-gu-ho in Korean). Only patients with vivid psychotic symptoms came to psychiatric department. Non-psychotic depression or anxiety disorders usually were not dealt in psychiatry. The etiology of mental illness seemed to be confined to biological factors including genetic predisposition. Psychosocial or psychodynamic factors as etiology of mental illness appeared to be ignored. Psychiatry was apparently separated from political or ideological issues. The mainstay of psychiatric treatment is the inpatient admission and out-of-date therapy such as insulin coma therapy. Stigma over mental illness was common in North Korea. Suicide is considered as a betrayal to his/her nation, and has been reported to be very rare. Conclusion : The situation of psychiatry in North Korea is largely different from that of South Korea. Although some aspects of North Korean psychiatry are similar to psychiatry in former socialist countries, North Korean psychiatry is considered to have also its unique characteristics.