• Korea journal of population studies
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.15-59
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• 1992

After world war II Japanese life expectancy has been improved remarkably, and reached the highest level in the world around late 1970's. The life expectancy of Korean has also shown tremendous improvement in recent years with about 20 year's gap from the Japanese. The reason of rapid improvement of life expectancy can be explained by changes in the structure of cause of death due to health system, living standard, social welfare, health behavior of individuals and so on. Korean in Japan is placed under different situations from both Korean in Korea and Japanese in these regards, and expected to show different picture of cause of death pattern. The objective of this study is the comparision of changing patterns of cause of death of three population groups, Korean in Japan, Korean in Korea and Japanese, and to investigate the reasons which effect to the structural difference of mortality cause with special emphasis on health ecological aspects. One of the major limitations of the Korean causes of death statistics is the under-registration which ranges about 10% of the total events, and inaccuracy of the exact cause of death. Some 20% of registered deaths were unable to classify by ICD. However, it is concluded that the Korean data are evaluated as sufficient to stand for over-viewing of trends of cause of death pattern. The evaluation is done by comparing data from registration and field survey over the same population sample. Population data of Korean in Japan differ between two sources of data; census and foreigner's registration. Correction is done by life table method under the assumption that age-specific mortality pattern would accord with that of the Japanese. The crude death rate was lowest among Korean in Japan, 5.7 deaths per 1,000 population in 1965. The crude death rates of Korean in Japan and Japanese are increasing recently influenced by age structure while Korean in Korea still shows decreasing tendency. The adjusted death rate is lowest among Japanese, followed by Korean in Japan, and Korean in Korea. The leading causes of death of Korean in Korea until 1960's was infectious diseases including pneumonia and tuberculosis. The causes of death structure changed gradually to accidents, neoplasm, hypertensive disease, cerebro-vascular disease in order. The main difference in cause of death between Korean and Japanese if high rate of liver diseases and diabetes for both Korean in Japan and Korea. A special feature of cause of death among Korean in Korea is remakably high rate of hypertensive disease, which is assumed to be caused by physicians tendency in choosing diagnostic categories. The low ischemic heart disease and high vasculo-cerebral disease are the distinctive characteristic of the three population groups compared to western countries. Specific causes of death were selected for detailed sex, age and ethnic group comparisons based on their high death rates. Cancer is the cause of death which showed most dramatical increase in all three population groups. In Korea 20.1% of all death were caused by cancer in 1990 compared with 10.5% in 1981. Cancer of the liver is the leading cause of cancer death among Korean in Japan for both sexes, followed by cancer of the lung and cancer of the stomach, while that of Korean in Korea is cancer of the stomach, followed by cancer of the liver and cancer of the lung for male. Causes of infant mortality were examined among the three population groups since 1980 on yearly bases. For both Japanese and Korean in Japan, leading cause of death ranks as conditions originating in the perinatal period, congenital anomalies, accidents and other violent causes. Trends since 1980 for these two population groups in the leading cause of infant mortality showed no changes. On the contrary, significant changes in leading cause of death structure in Korea were observed : the ranking of leading cause of death in 1981 were congenital asnomalies, pneumonia bronchitis, infectious disease, heart disease, conditions originating in the perinatal period, accident and other violent causes ; in 1990 the ranking shifted to congenital anomalies, accident, pneumonia bronchities, conditions originating in the perinatal period, infectious disease. The mortality rate by congenital anomalies in Korea continuously grew than any other causes. Larger increase ocurred during the 1990's

• Journal of Gastric Cancer
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.11-17
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• 2006

Purpose: The five-year survival rate is over 95% for radically resected early gastric cancer. The development of diagnostic techniques enables early detection of gastric cancer, so the life expectancy of patients with early gastric cancer is prolonged. Therefore, a limited number of surgeries are performed these days for the purpose of increasing the quality of life. The purpose of this study is to assess the postoperative quality of life after a pylorus-preserving gastrectomy (PPG) compared with that after a subtotal gastrectomy with gastroduodenal anastomosis (B-I). Materials and Methods: One hundred seven (107) patients who underwent gastric surgery for early gastric cancer from January 1999 to December 2003 at the Department of Surgery of Chonnam National University Hospital were selected. We compared patients who underwent a PPG with those who underwent a B-I. The clinical results were compared by using the chi-square test and the Student's T-test. The data were considered to be significant when the P value was less than 0.05. Results: Twenty-nine patients (29) underwent a PPG, and the other seventy-eight (78) patients underwent a B-I. There was no significant difference between the two groups on sex, age, and postoperative abdominal symptoms. The patients who underwent a PPG showed shorter operation times and less reflux gastritis and esophagitis on endoscopic evaluation than the patients who underwent a B-I. Conclusion: The pylorus-preserving gastrectomy (PPG) is a more physiologic operation than the subtotal gastrectomy with gastroduodenal anastomosis (B-I) and improves the postoperative quality of life.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.49 no.2
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• pp.198-206
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• 2000

Background : Pulmonary complications following bonemarrow transplantation (BMT) are common and associated with a high mortality rate. We investigated the yield, safety, and impact of fiberoptic bronchoscopy (FOB) for diagnosis of postBMT pneumoniae. Methods : From May 1997 to April 2000, 56 FOBs were performed in 52 post BMT patients for clinical pneumoniae. BMT patients with respiratory symptoms and/or pulmonary infiltrates had a thoracic HRCT(high resolution computed tomography) and bronchoscopic examination including BAL (bronchoalveolar lavage), TBLB (transbronchial lung biopsy), PSB (protected specimen brush). Results : The characteristics of the subjects were as follows : 37 males, 15 females, mean age of 31.3 years(l7-45), 35 sibling donor allogenic BMTs, 15 nonrelated donor allogenic BMTs, and 2 autologous BMTs. Fiftynine percent of FOBs (33 FOBs, 31 patients) were diagnostic. Isolated pathogens included the following : 12 cytomegalovirus (CMV) (21.4 %), 7 pneumocystis carinii (PC) (12.5 %), 11 CMV with PC (19.6 %), 2 Mycobacaterium tuberculosis (3.6%), and 1 streptococcus (1.8%). Most of the radiographic findings were diffuse interstitial lesions. CMV pneumoniae had mainly diffuse interstitial nodular lesion, and PC pneumoniae had diffuse, interstitial ground glass opacity(GGO). When CMV was accompanied by PC, a combined pattern of nodular and GGO was present. Of the 56 cases (23.2%), 13 died of CMV pneumoniae (n=2), PCP (n=2),mixed infection with CMV and PC (n=3), underlying GVHD (n=1), underlying leukemia progression (n=1), or respiratory failure of unknown origin (n=4). There was no major complication by bronchoscopy. Only 3 cases developed minor bleeding and 1 episode temporary hypoxemia. Conclusion : Based on our findings, CMV and PC are the major causes of postBMT pneumoniae. In addition, BAL can be considered a safe and accurate procedure for the evaluation of pulmonary complications after BMT.

• Journal of the Korean Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.81-94
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• 2003

Objectives：Developmental reading disorder is a condition which manifests significant developmenttal delay in reading ability or persistent errors. About 3-7% of school-age children have this condition. The purpose of the present study was to validate the diagnostic values of Word/Nonword Reading Test and Letter-Symbol Discrimination Task for the purpose of overcoming the caveats of Basic Learning Skills Test. Methods：Sixty-three reading-disordered patients(mean age 10.48 years old) and sex, age-matched 77 normal children(mean age 10.33 years old) were selected by clinical evaluation and DSM-IV criteria. Reading I and II of Basic Learning Skills Test, Word/Nonword Reading Test, and Letter-Symbol Discrimination Task were carried out to them. Word/Nonword Reading Test：One hundred usual highfrequency words and one hundred meaningless nonwords were presented to the subjects within 1.2 and 2.4 seconds, respectively. Through these results, automatized phonological processing ability and conscious letter-sound matching ability were estimated. Letter-Symbol Discrimination Task：mirror image letters which reading-disordered patients are apt to confuse were used. Reliability, concurrent validity, construct validity, and discriminant validity tests were conducted. Results：Word/Nonword Reading Test：the reliability(alpha) was 0.96, and concurrent validity with Basic Learning Skills test was 0.94. The patients with developmental reading disorders differed significantly from normal children in Word/Nonword Reading Test performances. Through discriminant analysis, 83.0% of original cases were correctly classified by this test. Letter-Symbol Discrimination Task：the reliability(alpha) was 0.86, and concurrent validity with Basic Learning Skills test was 0.86. There were significant differences in scores between the patients and normal children. Factor analysis revealed that this test were composed of saccadic mirror image processing, global accuracy, mirror image processing deficit, static image processing, global vigilance deficit, and inattention-impulsivity factors. By discriminant analysis, 87.3% of the patients and normal children were correctly classified. Conclusion：The patients with developmental reading disorders had deficits in automatized visuallexical route, morpheme-phoneme conversion mechanism, and visual information processing. These deficits were reliably and validly evaluated by Word/Nonword Reading Test and Letter-Symbol Discrimination Task.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.40 no.2
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• pp.177-184
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• 1993

Background: Accurate staging of bronchogenic carcinoma is important in determining resectability and metastasis of tumor to the subcarinal nodes is generally believed to indicate poor prognosis. The technique of Transbronchial needle aspiration (TBNA) has offered a safe & effective way to asscess mediastinal lymph node involvement in the staging of lung cancer. We performed TBNA in patients who were suspected lung cancer to evaluate the clinical usefulness of the TBNA. Method: TBNA of the subcarinal lymph node was performed at the time of initial diagnostic bronchoscopy in 60 patients with suspected lung cancer, and 42 cases of histologically proved bronchogenic cancer were analized. Results: The frequency of adequate samples by transbronchial needle aspiration (TBNA) was 81% and the positive rate of malignant cells by TBNA was 14.7%. There were no differences in positive rates by tumor cell types. In patients with thickened carina on bronchoscopy, the TBNA was positive in 33.3% as compared to 5.3% of normal carina on bronchoscopy, and the difference was statistically significant (p<0.05). In patients with enlarged subcarinal lymph node on chest CT, the positive rate of malignant cells (50.0%) was higher than that of normal sized subcarinal lymph node on chest CT (4.8%) (p<0.01). There were no specific complications in the TBNA procedure. Conclusion: TBNA is a relatively safe procedure and it offers the possibility of avoiding the cost and morbidity of surgical staging in patients especially whose carina is thickened on bronchoscopy and whose subcarinal LN was enlarged on chest CT.

• Journal of Gastric Cancer
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.263-269
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• 2006

Purpose: The aim of this study was to investigate the causes of under-staging in patients with advanced gastric cancer that was proven to be unresectable after a laparotomy. Materials and Methods: We retrospectively analyzed 25 gastric cancer patients who had undergone a diagnostic laparotomy between 2001 and 2005. For the preoperative evaluation, spiral CT and multidetector-row CT were performed. We analyzed the clinicopathologic features of patients and compared the image findings and the results of surgery. The causes of under-staging were divided into 3 groups; patient factor, CT factor, and interpretation factor. Results: Grossly, there were 12 cases of Borrmann type-III tumors and 13 cases of Borrmann type-IV tumors. The most frequent histologic type was poorly differentiated adenocarcinomas (8 cases) and signet ring cell carcinomas (7 cases). There were 13 cases of adjacent organ invasion, and the pancreas was the most frequently invaded organ (9 cases). There were 17 cases of peritoneal metastasis, and 3 cases of distant lymph node metastasis. For the cause of under-staging, there were four cases of patient factor, 19 cases of interpretation factor, and 9 cases of CT factor. In three cases, the cause of under-staging could not be identified. Conclusion: CT interpretation factor was the most frequent cause of under-staging in the preoperative diagnosis with gastric cancer patients. Therefore, more cautious CT interpretation is necessary to avoid unnecessary laparotomies in gastric cancer patients.

• Journal of radiological science and technology
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.327-334
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• 2010

Exposure during childhood results in higher risk for certain detrimental cancers than exposure during adulthood. We measured entrance skin dose (ESD) under 7-year children undergoing chest imaging and compared the relationship between ESD and age, height, weight, chest thickness. Though it is important to measure chest thickness for setting up the exposure condition of chest examination, it is difficult to measure chest thickness of children. We set up exposure parameters according to age because chest thickness of children has correlation with age. In the exposure parameters, for chest A-P examination under 2 year-children, tube voltage (kVp) in hospital A was higher than that in hospital B while tube current (mAs) was higher in hospital B, thus the ESD values were about 1.7 times higher in hospital B. However, for chest P-A examination over 4 year-children, the tube voltage was 7 kVp higher in hospital B, the tube current were same in all two systems, and focus to image receptor distance (FID) in hospital B (180 cm) was longer than that in hospital A (130 cm), thus the ESD values were 1.4 times higher in hospital A. For same ages, the ESD values for chest A-P examinations were higher than those for chest P-A examinations. Comparing ESD according to age, ESD values were $154{\mu}Gy$, $194{\mu}Gy$ and $138{\mu}Gy$ for children under 1 year, 1 to under 4 years and 4 to under 7 years of age, respectively. These values were lower than reference level ($200{\mu}Gy$) recommended in JART (japan association of radiological technologists), however these were higher than reference values recommended by EC (european commission), NRPB (national radiological protection board) and NIFDS (national institute of food & drug safety evaluation). In conclusion, the values of ESD were affected by exposure parameters from radiographer's past experience more than x-ray system. ESD values for older children were not always higher than those for younger children. Therefore we need to establish our own DRLs (diagnostic reference levels) according to age of the children in order to optimize pediatric patient protection.

• Journal of radiological science and technology
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.49-55
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• 2013

Currently, commercially available phantom can reproduce and evaluate only a static situation, the study is incomplete research on phantom and system which is can confirmed functional situation in the kidney by time through dynamic phantom and blood flow velocity, various difference according to the amount of radioactive. Therefore, through this study, it has produced the dynamic kidney phantom to reproduce images through the dynamic flow of the kidney, it desires to evaluate the usefulness of nuclear medicine imaging. The production of the kidney phantom was fabricated based on the normal adult kidney, in order to reproduce the dynamic situation based on the fabricated kidney phantom, in this study, it was applied the volume pump that can adjust the speed of blood flow, so it can be integrated continuously radioactive isotopes in the kidney by using $^{99m}Tc$-pertechnate. Used the radioactive isotope was supplied through the two pump. It was confirmed the changes according to the infusion rate, radioactive isotopes and the different injection speeds on the left and right, analysis of the acquired images was done by drawn five times ROI in order to check the reproducibility of each on the front and rear of the kidney and bladder. Depending on the speed of injection, radioisotope was a lot of integrated and emissions up when adjusting the pressure of the pump as 30 stroke, it was the least integrated and emissions up when adjusting as 40 stroke. The integration of the left & right kidney was not reached in the amount of the highest when adjusting as 10 stroke. In the changes according to the amount of the radioactive isotope, 0.6 mCi(22.2 MBq), 0.8 mCi (29.6 MBq)was showed up similar tendency but, in the result of the different injection 0.8 mCi, it was showed up counts close to double of 0.6 mCi. In the result of the differently injection speed of the left & right kidney, as a result of different conditions that injection speed was 20 stroke through left kidney phantom, the injection speed was 30 stroke through right kidney phantom, it was enough difference in the resulting image can be easily distinguished with the naked eye. Through this study, the results showed that the dynamic kidney phantom system is able to similarly reproduce renogram in the actual clinical practice. Especially, the depicted over time for the flow to be excreted through the kidney into the bladder was adequately reproduce, it is expected to be utilized as basic data to check the quality of the dynamic images. In addition, it is considered to help in the field of functional imaging and quality control.

• Journal of radiological science and technology
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• v.39 no.1
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• pp.99-105
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• 2016

The noise power spectrum (NPS) is one of the most general methods for measuring the noise amplitude and the quality of an image acquired from a uniform radiation field. The purpose of this study was to compare different NPS methodologies by using megavoltage X-ray energies. The NPS evaluation methods in diagnostic radiation were applied to therapy using the International Electro-technical Commission standard (IEC 62220-1). Various radiation therapy (RT) devices such as TrueBeam$^{TM}$(Varian), BEAMVIEW$^{PLUS}$(Siemens), iViewGT(Elekta) and Clinac$^R$ iX (Varian) were used. In order to measure the region of interest (ROI) of the NPS, we used the following four factors: the overlapping impact, the non-overlapping impact, the flatness and penumbra. As for NPS results, iViewGT(Elekta) had the higher amplitude of noise, compared to BEAMVIEW$^{PLUS}$ (Siemens), TrueBeam$^{TM}$(Varian) flattening filter, Clinac$^{R}$iXaS1000(Varian) and TrueBeam$^{TM}$(Varian) flattening filter free. The present study revealed that various factors could be employed to produce megavoltage imaging (MVI) of the NPS and as a baseline standard for NPS methodologies control in MVI.

• Journal of Veterinary Clinics
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• v.32 no.6
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• pp.486-490
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• 2015

Two-demensional echocardiography is routinely used for evaluation of cardiac function. Visualization of the endocardial border is essential for the assessment of global and regional left ventricular with cardiac disease. SonoVue$^{TM}$ is a microbubble contrast agent that consists of sulfur hexafluoride-filled microbubbles in a phospholipid shell. There were many studies about contrast echocardiographic examination using SonoVue$^{TM}$ contrast agent, and various doses of SonoVue$^{TM}$ were used. To our knowledge, in published veterinary medicine, there was not reported for diagnostic efficient dose of SonoVue$^{TM}$ to evaluate contrast enhanced left ventricular endocardial border delineation (LVEBD). The purpose of this study is to compare the visualization time of LVEBD and find efficient dose of SonoVue$^{TM}$ for using various doses in dogs. Ten healthy Beagles were recruited to the study. Three different doses (0.03 ml/kg, 0.05 ml/kg and 0.1 ml/kg) of SonoVue$^{TM}$ were injected. Endocardial segments were assigned based on previously established methodology, where by the four-chamber views of the LV were divided into 6 segments. In this study, Contrast enhancement of the LVEBD after each injection was evaluated visually at the time point of overall contrast enhancement (Segmental scoring 5+) in the LV by three investigators in a blind manner. Statistical analysis was performed with SPSS version 14.0. All data were analyzed using one-way ANOVA, the multiple comparison Scheffe test. When data for the three offsite readers were combined, mean durations of useful contrast were $3.54({\pm}2.14)$, $6.15({\pm}2.61)$, and $24.39({\pm}11.10)$ seconds for the 0.03 ml/kg, 0.05 ml/kg, and 0.1 ml/kg SonoVue$^{TM}$ doses, respectively. After injection of contrast agent, there were no significant change in side effects such as urticaria, angioedema, hypersensitivity reactions, and digestive system disorders. This study suggests that efficient dose of SonoVue$^{TM}$ contrast agent for improvement of the left ventricle visualization is 0.1 ml/kg. The duration of useful enhancement of LVEBD and the reproducibility were also the highest at the 0.1 ml/kg dosage.