• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.297-305
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• 2010

A home healthcare system based wireless sensor network, which can continuously monitor and manage the elderly's electrocardiogram(ECG) signal at any space at home without space limit is proposed. The communication coverage of wireless network is expended by multi-hop wireless sensor network. In order to send the elderly's ECG data wirelessly, a small size ECG sensor node was designed to forward the ECG data over multi-hop relay network. The packet acquired by mobile ECG node is transmitted through wireless intermediate nodes to base station for analyzing the packet reception rate. Modified minimum cost forwarding(MMCF) protocol and flooding protocol are designed and implemented to check the transmission efficiency of a packet in a wireless sensor network. The developed MMCF protocol shows an advantage of high reception rate by reduced network traffic.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.18 no.5
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• pp.337-342
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• 2009

This paper describes a robust mobile u-healthcare system with multiple physiological signs measurement capability in real time with integration of WSN(wireless sensor network) technology and CDMA(code division multiple access) network. A cellular phone receives health data in WSN and performs local physiological signs analysis at a phone processor, and then transmits abnormal data to server for further detail or precise health signal evaluation by a medical doctor over a CDMA network. Physiological signs of the patients are continuously monitored, processed and analyzed locally at cellular phone process to produce useful medical information for diagnosis and tracking purposes. By local simple analysis in cellular phone processor we can save the data transmission cost in CDMA network. By using the developed integrate ubiquitous healthcare service architecture, patients can realize self-health checking so that the prevention actions can be taken earlier. Appropriate self-monitoring and self-management can cure disease and relieve pain especially for patients who suffer from chronic diseases that need long term observation.

• Healthcare Informatics Research
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.387-393
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• 2018

Objectives: This paper describes an experience of implementing seamless service trials online and offline by adopting Internet of Things (IoT) technology based on near-field communication (NFC) tags and Bluetooth low-energy (BLE) beacons. The services were provided for both patients and health professionals. Methods: The pilot services were implemented to enhance healthcare service quality, improve patient safety, and provide an effective business process to health professionals in a tertiary hospital in Seoul, Korea. The services to enhance healthcare service quality include healing tours, cancer information/education, psychological assessments, indoor navigation, and exercise volume checking. The services to improve patient safety are monitoring of high-risk inpatients and delivery of real-time health information in emergency situations. In addition, the services to provide an effective business process to health professionals include surveys and web services for patient management. Results: Considering the sustainability of the pilot services, we decided to pause navigation and patient monitoring services until the interference problem could be completely resolved because beacon signal interference significantly influences the quality of services. On the other hand, we had to continue to provide new wearable beacons to high-risk patients because of hygiene issues, so the cost increased over time and was much higher than expected. Conclusions: To make the smart connected hospital services sustainable, technical feasibility (e.g., beacon signal interference), economic feasibility (e.g., continuous provision of new necklace beacons), and organizational commitment and support (e.g., renewal of new alternative medical devices and infrastructure) are required.

• International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.173-182
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• 2022

Healthcare organizations are overwhelmingly embracing smart value-based care strategies, which focuses on providing superior treatment at a significantly lower cost and quality of service (QoS). For these purposes, fifth generation (5G) of mobile service provides an innumerable improvement that clearly outperforms previous generations e.g., 3G and 4G. However, as with most advancements, 5G is projected to introduce new challenges, prompting the community to think about what comes next. This research was conducted to examine the most recent smart 5G technology applications and the solutions they provide to the healthcare industry. Finally, the paper discusses how the upcoming 6G technology has the potential to transform the future of healthcare sector even beyond the current 5G systems.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.203-213
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• 2023

This study examined the trend of healthcare status and compared the status of South Korea and other member of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) using the OECD health statistics 2022. We used the OECD health statistics from 2022 and a position value for relative comparison (PARC) index to compare the five elements of the healthcare system. The study also used a Mann-Kendall test to analyze the trend of the PARC values from 2000 to the present year. The findings of the study indicate that many South Korea's PARC values were higher than the OECD median. But practicing physician in supply part and medical cost were lower than OECD median but the trend significantly increased. Medical accessibility part and quality of care part except primary care, and mental health had a high relative position but the trend did not increased significantly. After outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019, there were changes in medical accessibility. Health screening and vaccinations showed an overall decline in 2020 compared to 2019. These results suggest that policymakers need to take necessary steps for a sustainable healthcare system in the country.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Information and Commucation Sciences Conference
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• 2011.10a
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• pp.681-682
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• 2011

RFID technique has been applied in high-security and high-integrity settings such as national defense, healthcare, and citizen identification. We proposed especially the privacy of sensitive data, various cryptographic techniques applicable to low-cost RFIDs in order to enhance the security of RFID.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.19-34
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• 2013

Background: The study describes the changes resulted from imposition on tertiary hospital outpatient coinsurance rate rise policy and in tertiary or general hospital drug coverage rise policy on healthcare service utilization. Methods: Accordingly, the hypothesis about outpatient healthcare utilization after rise policy in outpatient coinsurance rate and drug coverage was established, using interrupted time-series analysis and segmented regression analysis to test the hypothesis. 5-year analysis period (2007. 3-2012. 3) from the outset year was designated, the data about most common 10 high-ranking of the main diseases targeting visiting patient from age of 6 to 64 were collected. Results: The summary on the major research is followed. First, the medical expense and duration of treatment tends to be increased in case of imposition about rise policy in outpatient coinsurance rate in the tertiary hospital under the interrupted time-series analysis. It showed temporary increase and slow down on account of influenza A even after the policy enforcement. In segmented regression analysis, duration of visit and medical expense in the tertiary hospital increased temporally right after the policy implementation and the decreased rapidly depends on period. Both rise and fall is statistically significant. The second, In case of tertiary or general hospital outpatient drug coverage rise policy, all of the tertiary hospital healthcare service utilization variables by the interrupted time-series analysis, drug coverage policy in the general hospital deeply declined according to decreasing trend before policy implementation. The third, in case of segmented regression analysis, the visit duration and medical expense statistically declined right after the policy implementation in both the tertiary and general hospital. Meanwhile, administration day was statistically meaningful only for the decrease right after the policy implementation. Otherwise, general hospital changes are not statistically meaningful. And the medicine cost was statistically, meaningfully decreased after the increase in drug coverage. Conclusion: Finally, the result demonstrated according to the analysis is only 1 hypothesis is denied, the other 2 are partially supported. Then, tertiary hospital outpatient coinsurance rate increase policy comparatively makes decrease effect on long-term healthcare utilization, and tertiary or general hospital outpatient drug coverage policy showed partially short-term effect is assured.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.395-400
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• 2015

Both Japan and Korea provide population-based screening programs. However, screening rates are much higher in Korea than in Japan. To clarify the possible factors explaining the differences between these two countries, we analyzed the current status of the cancer screening and background healthcare systems. Population-based cancer screening in Korea is coordinated well with social health insurance under a unified insurer system. In Japan, there are over 3,000 insurers and coordinating a comprehensive strategy for cancer screening promotion has been very difficult. The public healthcare system also has influence over cancer screening. In Korea, public healthcare does not cover a wide range of services. Almost free cancer screening and subsidization for medical cost for cancers detected in population-screening provides high incentive to participation. In Japan, on the other hand, a larger coverage of medical services, low co-payment, and a lenient medical audit enables people to have cancer screening under public health insurance as well as the broad range of cancer screening. The implementation of evidence-based cancer screening programs may be largely dependent on the background healthcare system. It is important to understand the impacts of each healthcare system as a whole and to match the characteristics of a particular health system when designing an efficient cancer screening system.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.297-307
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• 2015

This study reviews equipped with enhanced capability of medical care, quality service, accessibility, and consumer awareness to be a competitive and representative local healthcare service provider with improved administrative efficiency. The method of analysis are ANOVA and Structural Equation Modeling. The results which revealed the significant difference among demographic factors in determining the preference or degree of satisfaction at medical service to select local healthcare institutions suggest that the close review on the needs of groups of major customers of local healthcare institutions are necessary when preparing the strategy of specialized medical service of local healthcare institutions. this suggests that both images would be important factors to secure the competitive advantage of local healthcare institution and therefore the strategy maximized the enhancement of medical service with embossed image of hospital to attract customers of medical service is needed.

• Journal of Korea Multimedia Society
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• v.22 no.5
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• pp.613-625
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• 2019

The rise of the Internet of Things (IoT) devices have greatly influenced many industries and one of them is healthcare where wearable devices started to track all your daily activities for better health monitoring accuracy and even down to tracking daily food intake in some cases. With the amounts of data that are being tracked and shared between from these devices, questions were raised on how to uphold user's data privacy when data is shared between these IoT devices and third party. With the blockchain platforms started to mature since its inception, the technology can be implemented according to a variety of use case scenarios. In this paper, we present a system architecture based on the healthcare system and IoT network by leveraging on multiple blockchain networks as the medium in between that should enable users to have direct authority on data accessibility of their shared data. We provide proof of concept implementation and highlight the results from our testing to show how the efficiency and scalability of the healthcare system improved without having a significant impact on the performance of the Electronic Medical Record (EMR) that mostly affected by the previous solution since these solutions directly connected to a public blockchain network and which resulted in significant delays and high cost of operation when a large amount of data or complicated functions are involved.