• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.1318-1324
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• 2010

Recently, U-Healthcare is receiving attentions as a research for reducing the manpower, time in treatment, and etc. Although fundamental technologies, such as sensing, measuring, and etc. are sufficiently investigated. However, Technologies of IT/Medical convergence, which graft IT technologies to medical area, are still in germ. For this, we present a novel healthcare system, which can be applied to the middle sized medical environment, such as private hospital, home, or etc., by means of pre-verified technologies and the expert system. There exist IT element technologies are sufficiently developed in the fields, such as network, database or etc. due to the remarkable developments in IT technologies, and the healthcare is a mission-critical environment. Therefore, it is important not only to investigate novel approaches but also to utilize verified technologies for the U-Healthcare solution. Presented solution provisions automated medical services based on expert system by utilizing the measured data, such as body fat, blood pressure, blood glucose, and etc., in order to provide convenient treatment environment to doctors and nurses. In addition, since people, who do not have medical knowledge, can self-diagnose themselves, it is expected to cut medical costs in various areas. Especially, since each devices communicate with each other through standardized Bluetooth technology, Presented healthcare system is an extensible solution which can easily accept various medical devices. As a result of this, we can safely say that the self measurement and diagnosis services in U-Healthcare are now enhanced by reducing medical cost through our healthcare system.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.38 no.3
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• pp.159-163
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• 2011

Objective: To compare the IVF outcomes of mild ovarian stimulation with conventional ovarian stimulation in poor responders. Methods: From 2004 to 2009, 389 IVF cycles in 285 women showed poor responses (defined as either a basal FSH level ${\geq}$12 mIU/mL, or the number of retrieved oocytes ${\leq}$3, or serum $E_2$ level on hCG day <500 pg/mL) were analyzed, retrospectively. In total, 119 cycles with mild ovarian stimulation (m-IVF) and 270 cycles with conventional ovarian stimulation (c-IVF) were included. Both groups were divided based on their age, into groups over and under 37 years old. Results: The m-IVF group was lower than the c-IVF group in the duration of stimulation, total doses of gonadotropins used, serum $E_2$ level on hCG day, the number of retrieved oocytes, and the number of mature oocytes. However, there was no significant difference in the number of good embryos, the number of transferred embryos, the cancellation rate, or the clinical pregnancy rate. In the m-IVF group over 37 years old, the clinical pregnancy rate and live birth rate were higher when compared with the c-IVF group, but this result was not statistically significant. Conclusion: In poor responder groups, mild ovarian stimulation is more cost effective and patient friendly than conventional IVF. Therefore, we suggest that mild ovarian stimulation could be considered for poor responders over 37 years old.

• Journal of Service Research and Studies
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.87-99
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• 2019

Healthcare and data science are often linked through finances as the industry attempts to reduce its expenses with the help of large amounts of data. Data science and medicine are rapidly developing, and it is important that they advance together. Data science is a driving force in transition of healthcare systems from treatment-oriented to preventive care in healthcare 3.0 era. It enables customized precision-based medicine that current healthcare systems cannot facilitate, and discovers more cost-effective treatment. Currently, healthcare big data is in the reality of medical institution, public health, medical academia, pharmaceutical sector as well as insurance agency. With this motivation, the medical college of Soonchunhyang university has performed a 'healthcare data science initiative(HDSI)' since 2014. Most of domestic HDSI programs focus on short-term contents such as mentoring and sharing cases for data science. Therefore, it is difficult to provide education tailored to the level of skills and job competency required at the practical site. Soonchunhyang HDSI implemented specialized strategies for improving resilience and response to changes in the IT education of current healthcare with the emphasis on the need for systematic activation of the practical HDSI. The HDSI has been performed as a part of on industry-academic link program in CK-1. Through quantitative and qualitative analysis, this paper discussed the HDSI process, performance, achievement, and implications.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.7 no.5
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• pp.181-188
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• 2016

This study investigated consumer convergence preferences for healthcare information service in social media using the multi-attribute utility theory. The multi-attribute utility theory is an approach for compositional modeling attributes wherein researchers compute the overall service utility by aggregating the evaluation results for attribute values. We found that healthcare information service consumers in social media evaluate the service preference through the multi attributes - Update, Cost, Usefulness, Usability, Reliability. And the study shows that individual preference by estimating weight of each attribute in the services influences the service use intention. So we believe that estimating preferences with multi-attribute utility theory will predict business success of the services in a new media, and for a successful business of the social media services marketers should assess the consumer's preference using the multi-attributes.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.65-84
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• 2012

Because of the rising healthcare costs, there is a growing need for developing efficiency indicators for medical resources use and measuring efficiency of healthcare providers and healthcare systems using them. In this study, we aimed to develop efficiency indicators for medical resources use by means of Delphi technique. We systematically reviewed the existing measures of medical resource use. Thirty nine indicators were selected as a candidates across the six domains: medical personnel, medical equipment, medical facilities, ethical management, resource efficiency, and drug use. To develop efficiency indicators with professional consensus, a 2-round Delphi survey was conducted among 29 professional experts. The following indicators were selected based on the Delphi survey results: adjusted number of the patient per day and level of the nurse number medical personnel in medical personnel domain; the number of the scan a professional physician and the quality of the scan in medical equipment domain; bed utilization rate in medical facility domain; drug price reported pharmaceutical price by medical institutions, medical fee billing transparency, and medical care appropriateness in ethical management domain; costliness index in resource efficiency domain; and utilization of high cost drug and items per prescription in drug use domain. The efficiency indicators could provide valid information about efficiency of healthcare providers and healthcare systems with respect to their resources use and facilitate policies to improve their efficiency.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Information and Commucation Sciences Conference
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• 2009.10a
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• pp.517-520
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• 2009

Healthcare application system has been actively researched to apply WSN technology to healthcare area with a mobile sensor node of low cost, low power, and small size. Sensor node has the problem for transmission range of RF power and time delay of the wireless routing connectivity between sensor nodes. In this paper, we proposes a new method utilizing mobile sensor nodes with relay sensor nodes for quick network routing changing using query technique in healthcare system. A query processor to control and manage the routing changing of sensor nodes in a wireless sensor network was designed and implemented. The user's PC transmits the beacon message which will change the quick link routing according to activity status of patient in wireless sensor network. We describe the implementation for query protocol that is very effective of power saving between sensor nodes.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.148-169
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• 2008

As the Korean Government began to perceive healthcare as one of foundational industries for national dynamics, there has been mounting advocacy for the introduction of for-profit hospitals with a view to bringing efficiency in healthcare services industries and improvement of their international competitiveness. The Government is now considering the issue from all angles in favor of permitting for-profit hospitals. However, There have been few precedent studies on this subject to provide helpful data for the discussion and in the health policy making. This study used private hospitals - for-profit and nonprofit - in Florida, USA as study subjects to accumulate basic data that may be utilized for those involved in debates and health policy making relating to the introduction of for-profit hospitals in Korea. Among all the private general hospitals in Florida, those surveyed by AHA(American Hospital Association) for four consecutive years from 2001 and 2004 and others reported about to MCR(Medicare Cost Report) included in the collected data for analysis. In total 139 private general hospitals consisting of 73 for-profit hospitals and 66 nonprofit hospitals were included in the collected analysis data. Results of analysis revealed no significant difference between for-profit hospitals and nonprofit hospitals in the usage aspects of healthcare services including the average length of stay and the ratio of Medicare vs Medicaid patients. However, financial performances indicated by such factors. as the pre-tax return on assets and the pre-tax operating margin showed to be significantly higher in for-profit hospitals compared with nonprofit hospitals. And the ratio of personnel expenses and the turn period of total assets showed to be significantly lower in for-profit hospitals. Based on the hypothesis that arguments about the introduction of for-profit hospitals have considerably different viewpoints depending on the size of hospital represented by the number of bed, these two hospital types were compared again using the number of beds as a controlled factor, but the results were similar. We, therefore, could conclude that the for-profit hospitals in Florida included in this study could, in their for-profit operation, improve their financial performance by pursuing cost reduction and effectively utilizing their assets without limiting the amount and the range of their services or avoiding less medically protected groups such as Medicare and Medicaid patients.

• Journal of Food Hygiene and Safety
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.68-76
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• 2021

Foodborne outbreaks frequently occur worldwide and result in huge economic losses. It is the therefore important to estimate the costs associated with foodborne diseases to minimize the economic damage. At the same time, it is difficult to accurately estimate the economic loss from foodborne disease due to a wide variety of cost components. In Korea, there are a limited number of analytical studies attempting to estimate such costs. In this study we investigated the components of economic cost used in foreign countries to better estimate the cost of foodborne disease in Korea. Seven recent studies investigated the cost components used to estimate the cost of foodborne disease in humans. This study categorized the economic loss into four types of cost: direct costs, indirect costs, food business costs, and government administration costs. The healthcare costs most often included were medical (outpatient) and hospital costs (inpatient). However, these cost components should be selected according to the systems and budgets of medical services by country. For non-healthcare costs, several other studies considered transportation costs to the hospital as an exception to the cost of inpatient care. So, further discussion is needed on whether to consider inpatient care costs. Among the indirect costs, premature mortality, lost productivity, lost leisure time, and lost quality of life/pain, grief and suffering costs were considered, but the opportunity costs for hospital visits were not considered in any of the above studies. As with healthcare costs, government administration costs should also be considered appropriate cost components due to the difference in government budget systems, for example. Our findings will provide fundamental information for economic analysis associated with foodborne diseases to improve food safety policy in Korea.

• The Korean Society of Law and Medicine
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.175-209
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• 2019

The bundled discounting which the dominant undertakings engage in is problematic in terms of competition restraint. Bundled discounts generally benefit not only buyers but also sellers. Specifically, bundled discounts usually costs a firm less to sell multiple products. In addition, Bundled discounts always provide some immediate consumer benefit in the form of lower prices. Therefore, competition authorities and courts should not be too quick to condemn bundled discounts and apply the neutral and objective standard in bundled discounting cases. Cascade Health v. Peacehealth decision starts ruling from this prerequisite. This decision pointed out that the dominant undertaking can exclude rivals through bundled discounting without pricing its products below its cost when rivals do not sell as great a number of product lines. So bundled discounting may have the anticompetitive impact by excluding less diversified but more efficient producers. This decision did not adopt Lepage case's standard which does not require the court to consider whether the competitor was at least as efficient of a producer as the bundled discounter. Instead of that, based on cost based approach, this decision said that the exclusionary element can not be satisfied unless the discounts result in prices that are below an appropriate measures of the defendant's costs. By adopting a discount attribution standard, this decision said that the full amount of the discounts should be allocated to the competitive products. As the seller can easily ascertain its own prices and costs of production and calculate whether its discounting practices exclude competitors, not the competitor's costs but the dominant undertaking's costs should be considered in applying discount attribution standard. This case deals with bundled discounting practice of multiple healthcare services by the dominant undertaking in healthcare market. Under the Korean healthcare system and public health insurance system, the price competition primarily exists in non-medical care benefits because public healthcare insurance in Korea is in combination with the compulsory medical care institution system. The cases that Monopoly Regulation and Fair Trade Law deals with, such as cartel and the abuse of monopoly power, also mainly exist in non-medical care benefits. The dominant undertaking's exclusionary bundled discounting in Korean healthcare markets may be practiced in the contracts between the dominant undertaking and private insurance companies with regards to non-medical care benefits.

• Journal of The Korea Institute of Healthcare Architecture
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.17-23
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• 2003

Among the countless elements for healing environment in healthcare facility, 'privacy' has been rather neglected in general hospital designs in Korea. The fact may be due either to present situation of excessively crowded patients or to cultural origin which more stresses on the mass than on individuals. However, as patient amenity has increasingly become important, privacy should be viewed as one of the key elements in the general hospital design, in order to improve the quality of patient service as well as to compete with other hospitals. Also it is very important that those methods for privacy improvement should be not only theoretically correct but also practical enough to be compatible with medical efficiency, space availability or construction cost within a particular hospital. The purpose of this case study is to present an actual examples to improve patients' privacy adopted in the schematic design of the Seoul Asan Hospital renovation project, along with comparisons with other hospital cases.