• Journal of Pharmacopuncture
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.5-25
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• 2004

Objectives : To observe changes in the serum proteins before and after intravenous injection of wild ginseng herbal acupuncture. Methods : Blood was collected before and after the administration of wild ginseng herbal acupuncture and only the serum was centrifuged. Then differences in the spots on the scanned image after running 2-Dimensionl electrophoresis were located and conducted mass analysis and protein identification. Results : Following results were obtained from the comparative analysis of serum proteins before and after the administration of wild ginseng herbal acupuncture. 1. 28 spots were identified before and after the administration. 2. In confirming manifestation degree, spots with more than two-times increase were 204, 803, 1505, 2205, 3105, 7104, 9001 spots, with more than one-time increase were 1101, 1302, 2013, 3009, 3010, 4002, 4009, 6706, 7103, 8006, 8101, and spots with decrease were 205, 801, 3205, 5202, 6105. 3. After conducting protein identification, proteins 205, 804, 1302, 4009, 6105, 6106 are unidentified yet, and 1101 is unnamed protein. Protein 204 is identified as complement receptor CR2-C3d, 801 as YAP1 protein, 803 as antitrypsin polymer, 1505 as PRO0684, 2013 and 3010 as proapolipoprotein, 2205 as USP48, 2403 as vitamin D binding protein, 3009 as complement component 4A preprotein, 3105 as immunoglobulin lambda chain, 3205 as transthyretin, 4002 as Ras-related protein Ral-A, 4204 as beta actin, 5202 and 7104 as apolipoprotein L1, 6704 as alpha 2 macroglobulin precursor, 7103 as complement component 3 precursor, 8006 as testis-specific protein Y, 8101 as Transferrin, 9001 as(Alpha-Oxy, Beta-(C112g)deoxy) T-State Human Hemoglobin, and 9003 as human hemoglobin. 4. Immune protein CR2-C3d, which acts against microbes and pathogenic organisms, and Antitrypsin(803), which is secreted with inflammatory response in the lungs, were increased by more than 200% after the administration of herbal acupuncture. 5. Immunoglobulin lambda chain(3105), Alpha-Oxy, Beta-(C112g)deoxy T-State Human Hemoglobin(9001), and human hemoglobin(9003) were increased by more than two-times after the administration of herbal acupuncture. 6. Proapolipoprotein(2013, 3010) and apolipoprotein(7104), key components of the HDL-cholesterol which plays an important role in preventing arteriosclerosis, were increased after the administration of herbal acupuncture. 7. Vitamin D binding protein(DBP, 2403), protecting the lung at the time of inflammatory response, was increased after the administration of herbal acupuncture. 8. Transthyretin(TTR, 3205), which is the main protein causing familial aimyloid polyneuropathy(FAP), was decreased after the administration of herbal acupuncture. 9. Ras-related protein Ral-A(4002) that controls phospholipid metabolism, cytoskeletal formation, and membrane traffic, was increased after the administration of herbal acupuncture. 10. Testis-specific protein Y(8006), which takes part in determination of the gender, was increased by more than two-times after the administration of herbal acupuncture. 11. Transferrin(8101), T-State Human Hemoblobin(9001), and Human Hemoblobin(9003) which balances the iron level in the body, were increased after the administration of herbal acupuncture. Conousion : Above results support the notion that intravenous injection of cultivated wild ginseng herbal acupuncture induce changes in serum proteins and this research can be a pioneer work in finding biomarkers.

• Sleep Medicine and Psychophysiology
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.57-63
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• 2015

Background and Objectives: Internet addiction is an increasing problem in Korea. The previous studies in this area have targeted adolescents and young adults. This study was conducted to examine the risk of internet addiction in Korean adults and the effect of internet addiction on circadian rhythm. Materials and Methods: For this study, 508 subjects were chosen through population proportional sampling to represent the adult population in Korea, 325 of whom were included based on the Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test-Korea (Audit-K), Zung's Self-Rating Depression Scale (SDS), drug use in the past year, and suicide attempts. In these subjects, sociodemographic factors including age, gender, and residential area were analyzed, and Young's Internet Addiction Scale (IAS), Morningness-Eveningness Questionnaire (MEQ), and an online survey examining sleep onset time on weekdays and weekends, wake-up time, and caffeinated drink intake were executed. Results: Of the 325 subjects, 136 (41.8%) belonged to a high-risk internet addiction group ($IAS{\geq}40$), and 189 (58.2%) belonged to a normal group (IAS < 40). There was a high proportion of male subjects (p = 0.03) in the high-risk group compared to the normal group. There was a high proportion of younger subjects (p = 0.055) in the high-risk group compared to the normal group, but this difference was not statistically significant. Compared to the normal group, there was a high proportion of the evening type ($MEQ{\leq}41$) in the high-risk group (p = 0.024), who also showed a high proportion of caffeinated drink intake (p < 0.001). Also, the high-risk group was found to go to bed and wake up late, but there was no statistically significant difference with the normal group. Conclusion: This study showed that many adults have a high-risk of internet addiction, and there was a significant correlation between internet addiction and sleep in adult, as has been found in adolescents and early adults. In the future, a longitudinal study will be needed to verify the causal relationship between internet addiction and morningness-eveningness.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.83-105
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• 2016

Measuring an individual's subjective wellbeing in an accurate, unobtrusive, and cost-effective manner is a core success factor of the wellbeing support system, which is a type of medical IT service. However, measurements with a self-report questionnaire and wearable sensors are cost-intensive and obtrusive when the wellbeing support system should be running in real-time, despite being very accurate. Recently, reasoning the state of subjective wellbeing with conventional sentiment analysis and unstructured data has been proposed as an alternative to resolve the drawbacks of the self-report questionnaire and wearable sensors. However, this approach does not consider contextual polarity, which results in lower measurement accuracy. Moreover, there is no sentimental word net or ontology for the subjective wellbeing area. Hence, this paper proposes a method to extract keywords and their contextual polarity representing the subjective wellbeing state from the unstructured text in online websites in order to improve the reasoning accuracy of the sentiment analysis. The proposed method is as follows. First, a set of general sentimental words is proposed. SentiWordNet was adopted; this is the most widely used dictionary and contains about 100,000 words such as nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs with polarities from -1.0 (extremely negative) to 1.0 (extremely positive). Second, corpora on subjective wellbeing (SWB corpora) were obtained by crawling online text. A survey was conducted to prepare a learning dataset that includes an individual's opinion and the level of self-report wellness, such as stress and depression. The participants were asked to respond with their feelings about online news on two topics. Next, three data sources were extracted from the SWB corpora: demographic information, psychographic information, and the structural characteristics of the text (e.g., the number of words used in the text, simple statistics on the special characters used). These were considered to adjust the level of a specific SWB. Finally, a set of reasoning rules was generated for each wellbeing factor to estimate the SWB of an individual based on the text written by the individual. The experimental results suggested that using contextual polarity for each SWB factor (e.g., stress, depression) significantly improved the estimation accuracy compared to conventional sentiment analysis methods incorporating SentiWordNet. Even though literature is available on Korean sentiment analysis, such studies only used only a limited set of sentimental words. Due to the small number of words, many sentences are overlooked and ignored when estimating the level of sentiment. However, the proposed method can identify multiple sentiment-neutral words as sentiment words in the context of a specific SWB factor. The results also suggest that a specific type of senti-word dictionary containing contextual polarity needs to be constructed along with a dictionary based on common sense such as SenticNet. These efforts will enrich and enlarge the application area of sentic computing. The study is helpful to practitioners and managers of wellness services in that a couple of characteristics of unstructured text have been identified for improving SWB. Consistent with the literature, the results showed that the gender and age affect the SWB state when the individual is exposed to an identical queue from the online text. In addition, the length of the textual response and usage pattern of special characters were found to indicate the individual's SWB. These imply that better SWB measurement should involve collecting the textual structure and the individual's demographic conditions. In the future, the proposed method should be improved by automated identification of the contextual polarity in order to enlarge the vocabulary in a cost-effective manner.

• Clinical and Experimental Pediatrics
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• v.51 no.6
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• pp.576-583
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• 2008

Purpose : The identification of specific behaviors conducive to overeating or inactivity is the cornerstone of obesity management. The Committee on Nutrition of the Korean Pediatric Society developed parent and self-reporting questionnaires about eating behavior and physical activity in 2006. The aim of this study was to evaluate the usefulness of the questionnaires in assessing modifiable lifestyle factors related to obesity. Methods : A retrospective chart review was performed for 177 children (6-11 years old) and 134 adolescents (12-16 years old) from 10 hospitals between May 2006 and January 2007 who had completed parent or self-reporting questionnaires. Cases were divided into normal and overweight groups at or above the age-gender-specific 85th percentile based on 2007 Korean national growth charts. Results : Compared to children, the adolescents tended to have a significantly more sedentary lifestvle and inappropriate dietary behaviors significantly (P<.05). Overweight mothers were significantly associated with overweight children and adolescents (P<.05). Being overweight was significantly associated with a family history of adult diseases for children and adolescents (P<.05). Inappropriate eating behaviors (strong appetite, eating fast, eating until they were full, binge eating, favoring greasy foods) were associated with being overweight in children and adolescents. Sedentary activity such as TV viewing and using a computer were significantly associated with overweight in children and adolescents (P<.05). Conclusion : Intervention to modify obesity-related lifestyle factors is needed before adolescence. These questionnaires are useful in identifying modifiable lifestyle factors and in individual counseling for overweight children and adolescents in pediatric clinics.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Food Science and Nutrition
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• v.42 no.5
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• pp.818-827
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• 2013

The purpose of this study was to identify food consumption patterns of the elderly and factors affecting them to improve their dietary health. Data from 1,172 elderly subjects (over 65 years old) from the fifth Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHANES V-1) were used in our analysis. Validity and reliability analyses of food consumption frequency allowed the identification of seven factors: fruits, foods for Korean style meal, instant foods, alcohols, carbohydrate-rich snacks, vegetables, and legumes/mixed grains. Food consumption patterns were classified into four groups (according to the food consumption frequency) using cluster analysis. Cluster 4 showed a significantly higher food consumption frequency and Cluster 3 had a relatively high overall food consumption frequency but lower alcohol consumption frequency compared to the other clusters. Cluster 2 was characterized by a generally low food consumption frequency but a significantly higher alcohol consumption frequency. Cluster 1 showed a generally low food consumption frequency; however, the consumption frequency of legumes/mixed grains was higher than Cluster 2. Further analysis showed that the food consumption patterns of the elderly were affected by variables such as gender, age, town, economic status, education level, family type, and frequency of eating out. We conclude that a proper nutritional education program should be conducted to address specific dietary problems for each elderly segment.

• Journal of the Korean Burn Society
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.21-29
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• 2021

Purpose: Frostbite is a hazard to people exposed to cold environments. With the progression of modern industrial development and change of leisure behavior encountering cold environments, frequent accidental exposure to frostbite injury during work and human behavior is increasing, and the predisposing factors of frostbite were greatly changed than before. The purpose of this study was to make epidemiological analysis, and to review the treatment outcomes of frostbite. Methods: From March 2010 to February 2021, this study has included 27 patients with second- to third-degree frostbite injuries in Advanced Burn Reconstruction Center, Bundang Jesaeng Hosptial. A retrospective study was made about the distribution of age, gender, predisposing factors, prevalent area, type of managements, and the length of treatment period. Results: In our institution, acute management of frostbite patients has included rewarming, anticoagulation therapy (acetylsalicylic acid), and agents to improve vascular perfusion (lipo-prostaglandin E1 [Eglandin^®]). The 25 frostbite patients with second-degree frostbite (92.6%) were successfully managed by the conservative treatment alone with a mean of 20.3 days healing time. Two patients with third-degree frostbite (7.4%) also showed good outcomes after surgical reconstruction with a mean of 59 days healing time. In our clinical experiences of third-degree frostbite, definitive surgical reconstruction should be recommended to wait for more than 4~6 weeks for identification of clear demarcation of necrotic tissue caused by frostbite. In this study, 43 frostbite injuries site in 27 frostbite patients occurred. Among them, 15 patients (55.6%) had multiple-site frostbite injury. The most common predisposing cause of frostbite was refrigerant gas accidents (44.4%), followed by outdoor activity in cold environments (40.8%), misapplying ice pack for treatment purposes (7.4%), barefoot walking on the cold ground (3.7%), and loss of consciousness in cold grounds (3.7%). The most prevalent sites of frostbite injuries revealed as the hand (58.1%), followed by the foot (32.6%), face (7.0%), and abdomen (2.3%). And in the winter season from the November to March, the incidence rate of frostbite injuries was high at 74.1%. Conclusion: This study included 27 frostbite patients with 43 frostbite sites since last decade in a single institution at the community hospital. The frostbite patients with second-degree frostbite (92.6%) were successfully healed by the conservative treatment alone with a mean of 20.3 days healing time. The most common predisposing cause of frostbite was refrigerant gas accidents (44.4%), followed by outdoor activity in cold environments, etc. The most prevalent site of frostbite injuries was the hand (58.1%). And the most prevalent seasonal incidence of frostbite was from November to March (74.1%).

• Journal of Yeungnam Medical Science
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.41-54
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• 2007

Background : The causes of chest pain vary but the leading cause of chest pain is ischemic heart disease. Mortality from ischemic chest pain has increased more than two fold over the last ten years. The purpose of this study was to determine the data necessary for rapid treatment of patients with signs and symptoms of ischemic chest pain in the emergency department (ED). Materials and Methods : We interviewed 170 patients who had ischemic chest pain in the emergency department of Yeungnam University Hospital over 6 months with a protocol developed for the evaluation. The protocol used included gender, age, arriving time, prior hospital visits, methods of transportation to the hospital, past medical history, final diagnosis, and outcome information from follow up. Results : Among 170 patients, there were 118 men (69.4%) and the mean age was 63 years. The patients diagnosed with acute myocardial infarction (AMI) were 106 (62.4%) and with angina pectoris (AP) were 64 (37.6%). The patients who had visited another hospital were 68.8%, twice the number that came directly to this hospital (p<0.05). The ratio of patients who visited another hospital were higher for the AMI (75.5%) than the AP (59.4%) patients (p<0.05). The median time spent deciding whether to go to hospital was 521 minutes and for transportation was 40 minutes. With regard to patients that visited another hospital first, the median time spent at the other hospital was 40 minutes. The total median time spent before arriving at our hospital was 600 minutes (p>0.05). The patients who had a total time delay of over 6 hours was similar 54.8% in the AMI group and 57.9% in the AP group (p>0.05). As a result, only 12.2% of the patients with an AMI received thrombolytics, and 48.8% of them had a simultaneous percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). In the emergency department 8.5% of the patients with an AMI died. Conclusion : Timing is an extremely important factor for the treatment of ischemic heart disease. Most patients arrive at the hospital after a long time lapse from the onset of chest pain. In addition, most patients present to a different hospital before they arrive at the final hospital for treatment. Therefore, important time is lost and opportunities for treatment with thrombolytics and/or PCI are diminished leading to poor outcomes for many patients in the ED. The emergency room treatment must improve for the identification and treatment of ischemic heart disease so that patients can present earlier and treatment can be started as soon as they present to an emergency room.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.59-69
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• 2010

Green or an environmental consciousness has been a major issue for businesses and government offices, as well as consumers, worldwide. In response to this movement, the Korean government announced, in the early 2000s, the era of "Green Growth" as a way to encourage green-related business activities. The Korean fashion industry, in various levels of involvement, presents diverse eco-friendly products as a part of the green movement. These apparel products include organic products and recycled clothing. For these companies to be successful, they need information about who are the consumers who consider green issues (e.g., environmental sustainability) as part of their personal values when making a decision for product purchase, use, and disposal. These consumers can be considered as eco-sumers. Previous studies have examined consumers' purchase intention for or with eco-friendly products. In addition, studies have examined influential factors used to identify the eco-sumers or green consumers. However, limited attention was paid to eco-sumers' disposal or recycling behavior of clothes in comparison with their green product purchases. Clothing disposal behaviors are ways that consumer can get rid of unused clothing and in clue temporarily lending the item or permanently eliminating the item by "handing down" (e.g., giving it to a younger sibling), donating, exchanging, selling, or simply throwing it away. Accordingly, examining purchasing behaviors of eco-friendly fashion items in conjunction with clothing disposal behaviors should improve understanding of a consumer's clothing consumption behavior from the environmental perspective. The purpose of this exploratory study is to provide descriptive information about Korean eco-sumers who have ecologically-favorable lifestyles and behaviors when buying and disposing of clothes. The objectives of this study are to (a) categorize Koreans on the basis of clothing disposal behaviors; (b) investigate the differences in demographics, lifestyles, and clothing consumption values among segments; and (c) compare the purchase intention of eco-friendly fashion items and influential factors among segments. A self-administered questionnaire was developed based on previous studies. The questionnaire included 10 items of clothing disposal behavior, 22 items of LOHAS (Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability) characteristics, and 19 items of consumption values, measured by five-point Likert-type scales. In addition, the purchase intention of two eco-friendly fashion items and 11 attributes of each item were measured by seven-point Likert type scales. Two polyester fleece pullovers, made from fabric created from recycled bottles with the PET identification code, were selected from one Korean brand and one US imported brand among outdoor sportswear brands. A brief description of each product with a color picture was provided in the survey. Demographic variables (i.e., gender, age, marital status, education level, income, occupation) were also included. The data were collected through a professional web survey agency during May 2009. A total of 600 final usable questionnaires were analyzed. The age of respondents ranged from 20 to 49 years old with a mean age of 34 years. Fifty percent of the respondents were males and about 58% were married, and 62% reported having earned university degrees. Principal components factor analysis with varimax rotation was used to identify the underlying dimensions of the clothing disposal behavior scale, and three factors were generated (i.e., reselling behavior, donating behavior, non-recycling behavior). To categorize the respondents on the basis of clothing disposal behaviors, k-mean cluster analysis was used, and three segments were obtained. These consumer segments were labeled as 'Resale Group', 'Donation Group', and 'Non-Recycling Group.' The classification results indicated approximately 98 percent of the original cases were correctly classified. With respect to demographic characteristics among the three segments, significant differences were found in gender, marital status, occupation, and age. LOHAS characteristics were reduced into the following five factors: self-satisfaction, family orientation, health concern, environmental concern, and voluntary service. Significant differences were found in the LOHAS factors among the three clusters. Resale Group and Donation Group showed a similar predisposition to LOHAS issues while the Non-Recycling Group presented the lowest mean scores on the LOHAS factors compared to the other segments. The Resale and Donation Groups described themselves as enjoying or being satisfied with their lives and spending spare-time with family. In addition, these two groups cared about health and organic foods, and tried to conserve energy and resources. Principal components factor analysis generated clothing consumption values into the following three factors: personal values, social value, and practical value. The ANOVA test with the factors showed differences primarily between the Resale Group and the other two groups. The Resale Group was more concerned about personal value and social value than the other segments. In contrast, the Non-Recycling Group presented the higher level of social value than did Donation Group. In a comparison of the intention to purchase eco-friendly products, the Resale Group showed the highest mean score on intent to purchase Product A. On the other hand, the Donation Group presented the highest intention to purchase for Product B among segments. In addition, the mean scores indicated that the Korean product (Product B) was more preferable for purchase than the U.S. product (Product A). Stepwise regression analysis was used to identify the influence of product attributes on the purchase intention of eco product. With respect to Product A, design, price and contribution to environmental preservation were significant to predict purchase intention for the Resale Group, while price and compatibility with my image factors were significant for the Donation Group. For the Non-Recycling Group, design, price compatibility with the factors of my image, participation to eco campaign, and contribution to environmental preservation were significant. Price appropriateness was significant for each of the three clusters. With respect to Product B, design, price and compatibility with my image factors were important, but different attributes were associated significantly with purchase intention for each of the three groups. The influence of LOHAS characteristics and clothing consumption values on intention to purchase Products A and B were also examined. The LOHAS factor of health concern and the personal value factor were significant in the relationships with the purchase intention; however, the explanatory powers were low in the three segments. Findings showed that each group as classified by clothing disposal behaviors showed differences in the attributes of a product, personal values, and the LOHAS characteristics that influenced their purchase intention of eco-friendly products. Findings would enable organizations to understand eco-friendly behavior and to design appropriate strategic decisions to appeal eco-sumers.