• Korean Journal of Health Education and Promotion
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.23-39
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• 2007

Objective: The objective of this study is to identify the risk factors for falls among the Korean elderly population. Methods: We analyzed the data on 167 persons of 65 years of age or older who have experienced falls drawn from the Third Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. We conducted a cross-tabulation analysis and logistic regression analysis of the impact of the socio-demographic characteristics, health-related behavior, mobility, and morbidity upon the frequencies of falls. Results: Among the socio-demographic characteristics, gender(p<0.001), marital status(p<0.1), and the type of medical insurance(<0.1) were found to be statistically significant, Among the constraints on mobility, the severity of walking problems, (p<0.001) and depression(p<0.05) proved to be significant, As for variables related to health-related behavior, the level of routine physical activities (p<0.001) was found significant, Finally, rheumatism(p<0.1), osteoporosis(p<0.05), diabetes(p<0.1), urinary incontinence(p<0.01) were also significant. A logistic regression analysis of the incidence of falls revealed that urinary incontinence was the most important risk factor with an odds ratio of 2.7. Conclusion: Although a variety of factors affect the frequencies of falls in the elderly population, urinary incontinence proved to be the single most important risk factor. This finding implies that education for fall prevention is crucial for those with urinary incontinence.

• Journal of the Korean housing association
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.19-26
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• 2014

The number of elderly who wants to access to Nursing Homes (NH) will increase due to the rapid aging society and domestic changes. Those who move into NH expect 24/7 care service in safe environment. Providing space free from danger, especially from fall, for the frail elderly is essential. The purpose of this study is to categorize performance needs of flooring materials in the aspect of safety, and analyze materials so that adequate ones for each space in NH can be suggested. Performance needs are as follows; slip resistance (dry/wet), fire resistance, resilience, water resistance, soil retardant, anti-bacterial, gloss, sound absorbtion. maintenance, durability, ease replacement, color and pattern variety, visual and tactual texture, tactile warmth, IAQ, sustainable material (before use), impact to nature (after use). They are categorized under function, economy, sensibility and sustainability. It was found that there are better materials than common ones that has been used repeatedly in NHs, such as vinyl sheets and VCT. In overall, Cork flooring and nylon carpet met all four categories, followed by wool carpet, rubber and linoleum. For bedroom, wood flooring, Cork, rubber, wool carpet, nylon carpets were suggested. In bathroom with shower, rubber, vinyl sheet and porcelain tiles were safe materials. As living/dining room and corridor floors, wool carpet, nylon carpet, cork flooring would be excellent as they are resilient and durable. The result of this paper can be used by both NH managers and material companies, resulting better quality of life of the elderly by providing safe environment.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.40 no.3
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• pp.495-505
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• 2016

This study explores and selects an appropriate material that considers light and soft physical properties as well as activity for impact absorption pads that can be used to develop practical impact protective clothes worn during daily life by the elderly to reduce the impact of falls. Physical properties, impact absorption performance, and compression characteristics were evaluated on 5 types of foam, 2 types of 3D spacer fabric, and 3 types of polymer gel to select a material appropriate for the pad to be inserted into impact protective clothes. The evaluation of the physical properties showed that 3D spacer fabrics had lower density compared to other materials and polymer gels had the highest density. The elongation percentage was higher in foams than 3D spacer fabrics and EPDM foam had the highest elongation percentage. The impact absorption performance of honeycomb polymer gel was better than foams and 3D spacer fabrics. As a result of looking into compression energy and compression characteristics of materials, 'CR foam A' was found to absorb the largest amount of compression energy, 24.1%, among foams and polymer gels. A high energy absorption rate of 50.0% (or above) was indicated by 3D spacer fabrics; however, foams and polymer gels showed a progressive deformation of energy compression / recovery curve with 3D spacer fabrics that showed drastic deformation. Based on characteristics of materials, 'CR foam C' and EPDM with relatively high absorption performance can be used as protective pad materials among foams. Among polymer gels, 2 open-type polymer gels that have relatively low impact protective performance but a relatively lighter weight on human body (compared to closed-type) are considered appropriate protective pad materials.

• Korean Journal of Adult Nursing
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.105-112
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• 2013

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of Tai Chi exercise on muscle strength, balance, flexibility and bone mineral density among community dwelling elderly women. Methods: A quasi-experimental pretest-posttest design with a nonequivalent comparison group was utilized, Elderly women were recruited from the community settings and assigned to either the treatment group (n=30) or the comparison group (n=34). Both groups completed the pretest and the posttest measures at six months with an 29.7% of dropouts. Tai Chi exercise was performed for 60 minutes, three times a week for 24 weeks. The study participants were referred to the sports clinic of the university hospital where an exercise therapist and a technician measured muscle strength, balance, flexibility, and bone mineral density without the knowledge of the group assignment. Data were collected from June 14, 2010 to May 27, 2011. Results: At the completion of 6 month Tai Chi exercise, the experimental group showed a significant difference in knee flexor strength (t=3.26 p=.002), flexibility (t=-2.93, p=.005), and bone mineral density in femur (t=2.20, p=.032), compared to the control group. Conclusion: Tai Chi exercise could be performed safely to community dwelling elderly women and effective for preventing declining in physical function in this population. Whether or not this health benefits would lead fall prevention will require further study.

• The Journal of Korean Academy of Orthopedic Manual Physical Therapy
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.19-24
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• 2011

Background: The elderly are likely to fall due to physical and mental atrophies, and experiencing falls may result in fear of falls and lack of self-confidence, which also leads to hesitation to physical activities and changes in walk and balance, the major variables in independent daily life. Methods: In three senior citizen centers located in D city, 22 elderly women aged 65 or older were chosen, and they filled in the questionnaire which included their agreement to voluntarily participate in the survey and medical histories. As to whether they had falls experience, the medical history items in the questionnaire asked them if they had falling down or falls once a year, twice for the three years. The objects were divided to NFE (non-falls experience) and FE (falls experience). Results: 1. As to walking abilities, significant difference was found between NFE and FE regarding walk width, stepping with two feet, and stride length while there was no significant different in terms of cadence. 2. As to balancing abilities, was significant difference between NFE and FE in terms of the physical body center area. As to the sit-to-stand, tandom gait test, no significant difference was found, and neither in the timed up and go test. Conclusions: The elderly with falls experience has inferior walking and balancing abilities to those without falls experience, and thus they are more exposed to the risks of falls.

• Korean Journal of Applied Biomechanics
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.397-405
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• 2016

Objective: Pilates is a low/mid-intensity exercise that can be easily performed by elderly individuals as it is an individual body-oriented exercise. It is also a cardio workout that can be performed anywhere to develop strength and flexibility. Therefore, we investigated the effects of 8 week Pilates program on the balancing ability of elderly individuals. Method: The research participants were selected from elderly residents in B city. Ten individuals voluntarily signed an agreement to undergo free measurements as well as to participate in the workout program. (Height: $157.1{\pm}11.9cm$, Weight: $61.7{\pm}8.0kg$). The Pilates exercise was performed 60 minutes a day, three times a week for a total of eight weeks. The measurement variables used to test balance were the vestibular test, 5 m habitual and maximum walk test and 3 m tandem walk test. A series of paired t-test were conducted using IBM SPSS Statistics 23.0 to analyze all the research data collected in order to determine the balance ability of the participants before and after the Pilates program. Additionally, the statistically significant level for all analysis was set to ${\alpha}=.05$. Results: In the vestibular test, some meaningful changes were observed in the length envelope area (ENV) while standing on one foot, but there were no significant differences in the ENV, rectangle(REC), root mean square, and total length. Results also revealed that statistically significant differences existed in the 5 m habitual and maximum walk test, as well as the 3 m tandem walk test. Conclusion: To summarize the findings, the 8 week Pilates program employed in this study significantly improved the dynamic balance of the elderly participants. Thus, elderly individuals that frequent perform Pilates are expected to enjoy positive benefits such as increased balance and fewer falling accidents.

• Journal of Internet Computing and Services
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.23-31
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• 2012

Nowadays, recognizing human activities is an important subject; it is exploited widely and applied to many fields in real-life, especially in health care and context aware application. Research achievements are mainly focused on activities of daily living which are useful for suggesting advises to health care applications. Falling event is one of the biggest risks to the health and well-being of the elderly especially in independent living because falling accidents may be caused from heart attack. Recognizing this activity still remains in difficult research area. Many systems equipped wearable sensors have been proposed but they are not useful if users forget to wear the clothes or lack ability to adapt themselves to mobile systems without specific wearable sensors. In this paper, we develop a novel method based on analyzing the change of acceleration, orientation when the fall occurs and measure their similarity to featured fall patterns. In this study, we recruit five volunteers in our experiment including various fall categories. The results are effective for recognizing fall activity. Our system is implemented on G1 smart phone which are already plugged accelerometer and orientation sensors. The popular phone is used to get data from accelerometer and results showthe feasibility of our method and significant contribution to fall detection.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.71-130
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• 2008

Using data from the Korean Labor & Income Panel Study (KLIPS), this study investigates private income transfers in Korea, where adult children have undertaken the most responsibility of supporting their elderly parents without well-established social safety net for the elderly. According to the KLIPS data, three out of five households provided some type of support for their aged parents and two out of five households of the elderly received financial support from their adult children on a regular base. However, the private income transfers in Korea are not enough to alleviate the impact of the fall in the earned income of those who retired and are approaching an age of needing financial assistance from external source. The monthly income of those at least the age of 75, even with the earning of their spouses, is below the staggering amount of 450,000 won, which indicates that the elderly in Korea are at high risk of poverty. In order to analyze microeconomic factors affecting the private income transfers to the elderly parents, the following three samples extracted from the KLIPS data are used: a sample of respondents of age 50 or older with detailed information on their financial status; a five-year household panel sample in which their unobserved family-specific and time-invariant characteristics can be controlled by the fixed-effects model; and a sample of the younger split-off household in which characteristics of both the elderly household and their adult children household can be controlled simultaneously. The results of estimating private income transfer models using these samples can be summarized as follows. First, the dominant motive lies on the children-to-parent altruistic relationship. Additionally, another is based on exchange motive, which is paid to the elderly parents who take care of their grandchildren. Second, the amount of private income transfers has negative correlation with the income of the elderly parents, while being positively correlated with the income of the adult children. However, its income elasticity is not that high. Third, the amount of private income transfers shows a pattern of reaching the highest level when the elderly parents are in the age of 75 years old, following a decreasing pattern thereafter. Fourth, public assistance, such as the National Basic Livelihood Security benefit, appears to crowd out private transfers. Private transfers have fared better than public transfers in alleviating elderly poverty, but the role of public transfers has been increasing rapidly since the welfare expansion after the financial crisis in the late 1990s, so that one of four elderly people depends on public transfers as their main income source in 2003. As of the same year, however, there existed and occupied 12% of the elderly households those who seemed eligible for the National Basic Livelihood benefit but did not receive any public assistance. To remove elderly poverty, government may need to improve welfare delivery system as well as to increase welfare budget for the poor. In the face of persistent elderly poverty and increasing demand for public support for the elderly, which will lead to increasing government debt, welfare policy needs targeting toward the neediest rather than expanding universal benefits that have less effect of income redistribution and heavier cost. Identifying every disadvantaged elderly in dire need for economic support and providing them with the basic livelihood security would be the most important and imminent responsibility that we all should assume to prepare for the growing aged population, and this also should accompany measures to utilize the elderly workforce with enough capability and strong will to work.

• Physical Therapy Rehabilitation Science
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.22-27
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• 2012

Objective: Falls are defined as contact of the body with the floor after losing balance during activities of daily living. Falls commonly occur among the elderly, and stroke patients in particular are at a high risk of falling. The purpose of this study was to investigate the changes of temporal and spatial gait parameters and gait symmetry according to experience falls in post-stroke patients. Design: Cross-sectional study. Methods: Fifty three patients with stroke were recruited on a voluntary basis from the rehabilitation unit, who currently undergoing physical therapy. All participants were asked to answer questions regarding the frequency of falls in the past 1 year. Fifty-three patients with stroke were allocated 2 groups according to experienced falls: stroke with falls (n=26) during past 1 year and stroke without falls (n=27). The spatial and temporal gait parameters and gait symmetry ratio were measured using GAITRite system. Results: The spatial gait parameters and the temporal gait parameters were significantly different between the stroke with falls group and the stroke without falls group (p<0.05). Furthermore, step length was the only significantly different among symmetry ratio (p<0.05). Conclusions: Experience of falls can lead to impairment of gait ability in stroke patients. This result is expected to be used as a basic data for rehabilitation program development to prevent a fall of post-stroke patients.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Physical Medicine
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.169-176
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• 2008

Purpose : Tandem stance is a clinical measure of standing balance considered to assess postural steadiness in a heel-to-toe position by a temporal measurement. The aim of this study is to investigate postural steadiness and to explore the weight distribution between legs during 25s of quiet stance and tandem stance(right foot was leading) in healthy young adults. Methods : 107 healthy young adults(mean age 21.1 years) are participated. Weight distribution beneath both feet and sway distance were recorded while the subjects performed 25s of quiet stance and tandem stance. Results : Subjects placed more weight on the rear leg in tandem stance and on the left foot in quiet stance. So, quiet stance and tandem stance is not a task for equal weight bearing. Subjects show larger sway distance in anteroposterior direction of tandem stance than quiet stance. Conclusion : The results of this study will be useful to researchers and clinicians using tandem stance measures to evaluate postural steadiness and to predict fall. The results suggest that tandem stance is useful to treat of weight distribution and to improve of balace in elderly adults and stroke patients.