• Journal of Korean Medicine Rehabilitation
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.89-106
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• 2022

Objectives In this study, a scoping review was conducted to inform decision-making related to traditional Korean medicine for people with disabilities in the future. Methods Seven databases were searched to find previous studies on traditional Korean medicine for people with disabilities. Studies published until August 2021 were considered. Using the methodology of scoping review, research on traditional Korean medicine for people with disabilities was reviewed with the following steps: 1) drawing research questions, 2) searching for related studies, 3) selecting studies, 4) extracting data, and 5) analyzing and reporting results. Results Out of 2,072 studies, 7 research papers and 10 reports were finally selected. The research papers included 5 cases studies, 1 survey study, and 1 chart review. Most studies used herbal medicine and acupuncture treatment, but the reports on the interventions were not detailed. The reports included policy studies, project performance guidelines, and project results reports, and most of the evaluation indicators tended to be standardized. Conclusions This study reviewed the literature on traditional Korean medicine for people with disabilities. It presents future directions for clinical research on traditional Korean medicine for people with disabilities and can be used to inform healthcare policies and clinical practice. In the future, quantitative research such as clinical trials, meta-analysis, and health insurance big data analysis is needed to understand the current status and effects of traditional Korean medicine for people with disabilities. In addition, qualitative research is necessary to identify unmet demands of traditional Korean medicine for people with disabilities.

• Journal of Pharmacopuncture
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.14-20
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• 2024

Objectives: Frozen shoulder (FS) is one of the most challenging shoulder disorders for patients and clinicians. Its symptoms mainly include any combination of stiffness, nocturnal pain, and limitation of active and passive glenohumeral joint movement. Conventional treatment options for FS are physical therapy, nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, injection therapy, and arthroscopic capsular release, but adverse and limited effects continue to present problems. As a result, pharmacoacupuncture (PA) is getting attention as an alternative therapy for patients with FS. PA is a new form of acupuncture treatment in traditional Korean medicine (TKM) that is mainly used for musculoskeletal diseases. It has similarity and specificity compared to corticosteroid injection and hydrodilatation, making it a potential alternative injection therapy for FS. However, no systematic reviews investigating the utilization of PA for FS have been published. Therefore, this review aims to standardize the clinical use of PA for FS and validate its therapeutic effect. Methods: The protocol was registered in Prospero (CRD42023445708) on 18 July 2023. Until Aug. 31, 2023, seven electronic databases will be searched for randomized controlled trials of PA for FS. Authors will be contacted, and manual searches will also be performed. Two reviewers will independently screen and collect data from retrieved articles according to predefined criteria. The primary outcome will be pain intensity, and secondary outcomes will be effective rate, Constant-Murley Score, Shoulder Pain and Disability Index, range of motion, quality of life, and adverse events. Bias and quality of the included trials will be assessed using the Cochrane handbook's risk-of-bias tool for randomized trials. Meta analyses will be conducted using Review Manager V.5.3 software. GRADE will be used to evaluate the level of evidence for each outcome. Results: This systematic review and meta-analysis will be conducted following PRISMA statement. The results will be published in a peer-reviewed journal. Conclusion: This review will provide scientific evidence to support health insurance policy as well as the standardization of PA in clinical practice.

• The Korean Society of Law and Medicine
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.159-193
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• 2015

Owing to causes such as population aging, increased use of various medical devices, long-term hospitalization of various patients with reduced immune function such as cancer, diabetes, and organ transplant patients, and the growing size of hospitals, hospital infections are continuing to increase. As seen in the MERS crisis of 2015, hospital infections have become a social and national problem. In order to prevent damage due to such hospital infections, it is necessary to first strictly implement measures to prevent hospital infections, while, on the other hand, providing proper relief of damage suffered due to hospital infections. However, the mainstream attitude of judicial precedents relating to hospital infection cases has been judged to in fact shift responsibility over damages due to hospital infections on the patient. In light of the philosophy of the damage compensation system, whose guiding principle if the fair and proper apportionment of damages, there is a need to seek means of drastically relaxing the burden of proof on the patient's side relative to conventional legal principles for relaxing the burden of proof, or the theory of de facto estimation. In relation to such need, the German civil code (Burgerliches Gesetzbuch), which defines contracts of medical treatment as typical contracts under the civil code, and has presumption of negligence provisions stipulating that, in cases such as hospital infections which were completely under the control of the medical care providers, if risks in general medical treatment have been realized which cause violations of the life, body, or health of patients, error on the part of the person providing medical care is presumed, was examined. Contracts of medical treatment are entered into very frequently and broadly in the everyday lives of the general public, with various disputes owing thereto arising. Therefore, it is necessary to, by defining contracts of medical treatment as typical contracts under the civil code, regulate the content of said contracts, as well as the proof of burden when disputes arise. If stipulations in the civil code are premature as of yet, an option may be to regulate through a special act, as is the case with France. In the case of hospital infection cases, it is thought that 'legal presumption of negligence' relating to 'negligence in the occurrence of hospital infections,' which will create a state close to equality of arms, will aid the resolution of the realistic issue of the de facto impossibility of remedying damages occurring due to negligence in the process of occurrence of hospital infections. Also, even if negligence is presumed by law, as the patient side is burdened with proving the causal relationships, such drastic confusion as would occur if the medical care provider side is found fully liable if a hospital infection occurs may be avoided. It is thought that, alongside such efforts, social insurance policy must be improved so as to cover the expenses of medical institutions having strictly implemented efforts to prevent hospital infections in the event that they have suffered damages due to a hospital infection accident, and that close future research and examination into this matter will be required.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.39 no.5
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• pp.417-424
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• 1992

Background: There were many reports about the clinical aspect and outcomes of pulmonary tuberculosis in health center but few in a medium sized general hospital. The purposes of this study were to find any characteristic differencies in the patients and the general outcomes of the treatments and also to give some suggestive points for the insurance policy making. Methods: We made a retrograde analysis of the medical records of 1981 patients (male 992 female 1,059) who attended our clinics of the 4th internal department, Daedong general hospital during two years from January 1989 to December 1990. Result: 1) Of 1981 patients, 96 were diagnosed as pulmonary tuberculosis taking relatively large proportion in the prevalence. The ratio of prevalence between male and female was 7.81% to 2.27%. The 61.46% were the first diagnosis & initial treatment cases and the remaining 38.54% were the retreatment cases with no statistical significance between sex. 2) The most prevalent age group was between 21~40 years old and the prevalence rate was 45.45% of male and 76.76% of female. The lowest age group in male patient was above 61 showed 3.03%, and there was no female patients above age 60 years old. This phenomena could be thought as the negligence for the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis in the old age groups rather than true tuberculosis prevalence and it could be proved by the higher rates towards old age groups in the national tuberculosis prevalence survey. 3) There were 57.07% of the minimal case, 48.96% of the moderate, 18.75% of the far advanced. The sputum examination showed 37.07% were culture positive, 46.88% were the negative, and 15.63% of the patients had no stutum examination. Moreover, uncoperatives among the far advanced cases were notable showing 22.22% of the stutum examination, where 16.13% in the minimal cases. The stutum positive rate among the initial treatment cases were 41.07% and 55.00% for the retreatment cases. The sputum no examination rates were 17.86% and 12.50% respectively. 4) The classfication of the mode of disease onset showed 68.75% with gradual onset, 9.38% hemoptic, 3.13% acute pneumonic and 18.75% was found through the radiologic examination in various occasions. 5) The percentages of patients who continued their treatment for more than 8 month were 35.71% (for initial treatment), 25.00% (for retrement), 16.13% (for the minimal), 27.78% (for the far advanced). 6) The group of patients who were treated more than 8 months showed the negative conversion rate of 80% on sputum and marked improvement on chest x-ray in 56.67%. However, in far advanced or retreatment cases, the rate of negative conversion on sputum and the rate of improvement on chest x-ray were low being 60% and 20% for the former and 60% and 10% for the latter, each respectively. Conclusion: It would be strongly emphasized that the improvement of National medical insurance system and social welfare system in Korea must be definite to improve overall treatment and control of tuberculosis diseases as well as physician's devotious National tuberculosis control policy.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.11 no.12
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• pp.4863-4872
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• 2010

This study examined the disease conditions of patients from a farming and fishing village area. In order to analyze the medical service utilization, the necessary data were obtained from established health and medical care service plans from medical treatment related organizations. The following results were based on the analysis of data from the medical records of 2,365 discharged patients during a six months period from July to December 2009 at a general hospital in an aging farming and fishing village area. Results: The sex of the patients investigated was male 55.3%, female 44.7%, and the most frequent age category at 42.0% was 70 years of age or older. Based on type of hospital admission, 65.5% of patients who were admitted were originally outpatients. Patients were admitted according to the following departments: 49.7% for the department of internal medicine, 16.7% for the department of orthopedics, and 13.8% for the department of neurosurgery. The average number of days hospitalized was 14.8 days. The following ranks the principal diagnosis among patients in this study: S00-T98 18.4%, J00-J99 15.5%, and I00-I99 11.5%. The average number of diagnosis listed per patient was 5.6. There was a statistically significant difference for the following general characteristics according to principal diagnosis list: gender, type of insurance, admission process, and age category distribution had statistically significant differences. Monthly distribution of principal diagnoses were statistically significant difference. There was a statistically significant difference for principal diagnosis lists according to the average number of days admitted and the number of diagnosis. The results of this study showed the types of disease from typical farming and fishing village regions as disease from external injury due to the work environment of farming and fishing village regions and excessive labor throughout the year, respiratory disease, and various chronic disease from aging.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.56 no.1
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• pp.29-39
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• 2004

Background : The diagnostic and therapeutic approaches to mediastinal tumors and cysts have changed over the past three decades. This report summarizes our forty-two years of experience with these tumors. Methods : This study retrospectively reviewed 479 patients with primary mediastinal tumors and cysts that were diagnosed and managed over the past 17-year period (1985~2002) and compared them to the report of the previous 25-year result (1960~1985) in Yonsei University College of Medicine, Severance Hospital in Seoul, Korea. Results : During the 17 years, there were 479 cases of pathologically proven mediastinal tumors and cysts. Thymoma (38.2%) was the most common mediastinal tumor and has increased noticeably during recent years. The gender ratio showed a male predominance (1.3:1) and the age distributions were even over all the age groups. The most common sites of the tumor and the proportion(28.6%) of malignant tumors were the same as that previously reported. A diagnosis of a tumor in asymptomatic patients was possible in 174 cases (36.3%), which was higher that reported previously. The diagnostic yield of a fine needle aspiration biopsy was 68.6% in the total tumors and 80.9% in the malignant tumors. A surgical resection was the most frequently chosen treatment modality and was performed in 405 cases (84.6%). The complete resection rate was 91.1%, which is higher than the previous result of 78.8%. Conclusion : These results showed that the prevalence of mediastinal tumors and cysts, particularly thymoma, increased. A fine needle aspiration biopsy was a valuable preoperative differential diagnostic method for malignant tumors. The surgical and complete resection rate increased remarkably possibly due to the better applicable chest CT scans, the more frequent health check-up provided by the regular health promotion program for all people as a health insurance policy, and the improved diagnostic techniques in the pathologic, radiological, and clinical fields.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.129-155
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• 2008

The rate of antibiotics prescription for an acute airway infection significantly varies depending upon the diagnosis type, specialty, and the location of the hospital along with many other related factors. The objective of this study is to empirically investigate the possible relationship between the antibiotics prescription rates for an acute airway infection and the degree of competition in the hospital market regions of mainly the providers of primary medical care services such as clinics, internal medicines, pediatrics and otorhinolaryngology department. Using the data from Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service (HIRA) regarding the hospitals' antibiotics prescription rates for the acute airway infection and controlling for selected variables of demand and supply sectors, this study tries to figure out that the degree of competition in the hospital market, regardless of what type of competition indexes we employed, has a statistically significant effect on the variations of antibiotics prescription rate of the clinics in local areas. This result implies that as an economic consideration itself, the change in the degree of competition in the hospital market can play a crucial role influencing the treatment behaviors of the medical doctors. More specifically, this study reveals that as the degree of competition increases the antibiotics prescription rate goes up. This result means that if the market becomes more competitive in a specific region so that it might cause a reduction in doctor's income, doctors with rational decision-making process, recognize that the benefit created from inducing patients' seemingly unnecessary demand for medical care (income effect) would be higher than the costs associated with sustaining their targeted income (substitution effect). It is because that the doctors are more likely to prescribe antibiotics which create relatively higher margins than other medical care services in order to sustain their targeted income when the hospital market competition becomes tighter. Even though this study empirically confirms that antibiotics prescription can be affected by the economic incentives, it still raises following issues as limitations of the study: first issue is about the representativeness of the hospital regions segregated for this study, which might be weak in explaining whether these regions are mutually exclusive in reality. Patients actually consider the quality of services, transportation cost, time costs, and any other related factors choosing the doctors or hospitals, and in that sense, this study rules out 'border-crossing' in using the medical care services. Second issue arises in capturing the data of antibiotics prescription rate. Since we use the average rate for each medical institution, we cannot figure out the average rate for each patient so that we are not able to control for the variation of patients' medical conditions. It is because of the unavailability of data regarding each patient's medical condition from HIRA. Thirdly, since this study mainly analyzes the medical institutions providing primary care such as clinics, internal medicines, pediatrics, and otorhinolaryngology department, it is skeptical of whether those institutions can represent the hospital market in respective regions and truly reflect the degree of competition. It needs to extend the study areas and disease types as well as any micro data for future studies.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.162-178
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• 1974

The present study is purported to provide a basic information to be utilized by nurses to care and attend effectively for patients nearing the moment of death. Therefore, the primary purpose of the study has been placed upon grasping an understanding of the trends of death in general. For this purpose: 1. By utilizing the schneidman questionnaire, the trend of death has been categorized by 6 parts and analyzed. 2. A search has been conducted to find out dying patient's needs, nurse's attitudes viewed by the patient, and nurse attitudes to dying patient. The followings are itemized results of analysis: 1. Analysis by the schneidman questionnaire. (1) In general concepts of death. the first sighting of the occurrence of death was experienced upon strangers, grandfather and great grandfather. The death is openly discussed among people of all ages and sex. Ages in which the death is mostly feared were from 12 to well over 70 yews old that are evenly distributed regardless of difference in age. (2) As to the attitudes toward death the occurrence of death to most closely associated person influenced most upon the attitude of their own termination of lives. Among the reading materials, the maximum influence was effected by the Bible. In terms of religion, the thoughts of death were Influenced by religions education in case of the believers of the western religions (36%), and by their own health and physical conditions in case of the believers in the oriental religions (35%). In case of non-believer, their attitude toward death were largely determined through their own thinking meditation (45%). People aged 20 or thereunder revealed that they wished to know the day of their own death to be occurred (58%). However, the older the less thor wanted to know. (3) As to the choosing the time of death, 57% preferred senility, and 30% preferred the time in mediately following the prime period of their lives in general. In terms of religion, 85% of the believer in the oriental religion preferred senility, and 67% in the western religion, 58% in others, Therefore. the desiring of their lives to be terminated in earlier stage, not by the natural senility. sequenced as follows : Others, western religions and oriental religions. (4) Referring to the disposal of the corpse under the assumption that it had already occurred, majority desired the burial system. There has been seen a slight tendency to consider the importance of holding funeral services for the sake of survivors. Concerning the life insurance policy, it showed that the nurse had less belief in it than the patient (5) Upon the subject of life-after-death. religion wise, 72% of western religion believers preferred to have an existence of life-after-death: Among the believers of oriental regions, 35% desired this category, 30% did not mind either way. and 35% did not desire the existence of such a life-after-death. In others, 53% did not mind whether or not such a life existed. (6) In general, serious thoughts were not being attended to the commitment of suicide. 37% emphasized that such an act should be prevented. However, 30% insisted that such commitment should not be bothered, and that society possesses no right to prevented it. More male wished to commit suicide (13%) than females (9%). 2. Nurse's attitudes toward terminal patients and patient's needs. In the instance where the patient realized that their death is imminent, most of them showed desire to discuses mainly on the problems of life. When faced a situation of this nature, it is revealed that 40% of nurses could not furnish appropriate care for them.

• Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.146-154
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• 2002

Purpose : Death due to cancer has been continuously increasing, therefore cancer is the first in the cause of death now. A national policy for the elevation of medical costs in cancer patients is necessary, therefore, we searched for the medical costs and its related factors in terminal cancer patients for the effective reduction of the medical costs. Methods : We reviewed the medical records of 259 hospitalized terminal cancer patients who had died during the period of July 1, 2000 to June 30, 2002. History of cancer included type of cancer, type of past treatment, existence of metastasis. Clinical manifestation was examined and medical costs on last admission was categorized based on the account of charges of the department of patient affair on the last hospitalization. For analysis of factors related with medical costs, ANOVA was used. Results : Of the 259 patients, the number of male was 135 cases (52.1%), and the female, 124 cases (47.9%). The most frequent type of cancer was stomach (21.9%) cancer. Of the clinical manifestation, anorexia (87.6%) was the most frequent manifestation. Total medical costs was 740,628,045won, the mean costs was $285,968{\pm}3,070,272won$. The frequent category of medical costs was injection (32.0%), medical accommodation (27.9%), examination (14.0%), in order. The only factor related with mean medical costs was pain (P<0.05). Conclusion : If unnecessary injection of opioid analgesics is reduced, hospice care at home is activated and excessive examination is reduced In terminal cancer inpatients, it will be possible to reduce the medical costs in terminal cancer patients more effectively.

• The Korean Society of Law and Medicine
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.263-291
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• 2015

In May, 2015, a 68 years old man, who has been Middle East Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, had high fever, muscle aches, cough and shortness of breath. he went two local hospital near his house and the S Medical Center emergency center. He was diagnosed MERS(Middle East respiratory syndrome) and the diseases had put South Korea the fear of epidemics for three months. Especially, this disease has firstly reported in Middle East Asia in September 2012 and spreaded to twenty-six countries. In 21, July, 2015, European Center for disease prevention and control reported 533 people were died and in South Korea, 186 people were infected, 36 people were died and 16,693 people were isolated from MERS. South Korea government were faced into epidemic control and blamed from public. Especially, hospital acquired infection, disease control chain, opening of information, ventilation, lack of isolation bed, the problem of function of local health center, the issue of reparation for hospital and insurance cover rate, the classification of disease, the role of Korea Centers for disease control and prevention, the culture of visiting hospital to see sick people, the issue of hospital multiple room and other related social support policy. it is time to study and discuss to solve these problems. South Korea citizens felt fear and fright from MERS. What is wore, they thought the dieses were out of their government control. It was unusual case for word except Middle East Asia. numerous tourists canceled visiting korea. South korea economic were severly damaged especially, tourism industry. South korea government should admit that they had failed initial action against MERS and take full reasonability from any damages. The government have to open information to public in terms of epidemic diseases and try to prevent any other epidemic diseases and try to work with local governments.