• Journal of Korean Critical Care Nursing
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.1-10
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• 2023

Purpose : This study explores the professional status of Advanced Practice Nurses (APNs) in Korea, who, despite being legally certified, face instability in their professional standing, including their scope of practice and compensation. Method : The study uses Flexner's professional characteristics as a framework to analyze and project the future trajectory of Korean APNs. Results : First, to ensure social accountability, professional bodies need to establish uniform nursing policies related to job roles, and healthcare institutions must adhere to these policies. Second, nursing leaders should spearhead the creation of nursing knowledge essential for the profession's advancement, aiming to establish it as the foundation for nursing practice through a consensus process within the nursing community. Third, the curriculum for APNs should enhance the quantitative and qualitative aspects of practice in response to societal needs. Fourth, professional bodies should formulate consistent nursing policies based on a thorough analysis of the healthcare environment and legal considerations, and guide their implementation in clinical practice through a consensus process within the nursing community. Lastly, guidelines should be established for professional standards suitable for the Korean context. Conclusion : Based on this review, it is recommended that all APNs adhere to the professional standards set by their respective organizations, actively participate in personal quality improvement initiatives, and fulfill their duties and roles as members of these professional bodies. Furthermore, these organizations should devise practical strategies to solidify the APN system and should spearhead a systematic consensus process that garners the agreement of all members within the nursing community.

• Korean Medical Education Review
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.35-45
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• 2022

Needs for public healthcare have recently increased. This paper proposes education topics for competency development in public healthcare in line with the needs of the times. In Korea, various lifelong education providers have already provided public health-related education. For example, the Research Institute for Health Policy (RIHP) under the Korean Medical Association provided an "executive course for physicians' public health care competencies" in 2019 and 2020. At the end of the course, the RIHP published a comprehensive report, entitled "Curricular development and evaluation for doctors' public healthcare competencies." This article is based on a summary of that report. To develop a curriculum for public healthcare, the RIHP adopted the following methodologies for a needs analysis; reviewing already-existing education subjects, evaluating end-of-course reports, and conducting in-depth focused group interviews and questionnaire surveys with doctors at public healthcare-related institutions. The results from the needs analysis can be categorized into two domains of education topics for public healthcare. The first domain includes education subjects related to the theory and practice of public healthcare, as follows: a general overview, community or population health, organizational administration, planning and evaluation, budget and finance, responses to disasters such as infectious diseases, health policy, and the legal system. The second domain contained education topics related to general professional competencies: leadership, communication, cooperation, teamwork, and professionalism. In conclusion, the curricular content for public healthcare will be an appropriate combination of competencies specific to public healthcare and core competencies for health professionals.

• Journal of Research and Publication Ethics
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.13-18
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• 2021

Purpose: This paper aimed to examine the ethical considerations that are the basis for many functions in the healthcare field. The key ethical values in global health, as well as future considerations imperative to this area, were observed. Research design, data and methodology: The current study utilized the past literature studies that were examined in the field of global health. An overview of the role of ethics in the healthcare field, as well as important considerations that needed to be taken into account in order to provide advancements in this area, were investigated. Results: Ethics are an important set of principles that guides humankind into the right conduct or action to better society and each other. Ethical values are one of the pinnacle points for any healthcare provider, as healthcare is not only considered from the aspect of patient health and well-being, but also in its role of keeping ethical guidelines to achieve the best possible care for a patient. Conclusions: A comprehensive understanding of healthcare is needed in order to tackle next generational challenges in global health. These ethical considerations will inevitably play a significant role in harnessing the patient-healthcare professional relationships as well as care for the shortening of a global disparity on healthcare.

• Journal of Information Technology Services
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.39-66
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• 2016

There is growing evidence that professional work is changing as a result of the application of information technology (IT). However, the impact of information technology on professional work has produced mixed results. Our paper considers the source of these mixed results through a greater analytical attention paid to the nature of professional work. Defined as work involving expertise expressed through abstract and formalized knowledge as well as extensive working knowledge, the professional work logic assumes the greatest autonomy and discretion for workers in collectively controlling work characteristics-division of labor and its permanence, control over education, and control over new entrants and the monitoring and disciplining of existing members. The impact of IT on professional work will be difficult to control and predict without considering the assumptions and tensions within and across the three major types of work logics (Professional, Market and Bureaucratic). Using healthcare as an example, the paper provides various propositions for researching the initiation and effects of ICT design through these three work logics. These propositions illustrate the active role that IS researchers can take in researching an important economic and work-related topic, professional work, and in understanding how ICT affects work-related expertise.

• Quality Improvement in Health Care
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.32-46
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• 2023

Purpose: Fire response education is critical for healthcare providers working in hospitals to ensure a safe environment for patients and staff. However, a comprehensive review that thoroughly examines the contents, methodologies, and outcomes of fire response education in hospitals is currently lacking. Methods: We conducted a scoping review by adhering to the framework proposed by Arksey and O'Malley. We searched five electronic databases for literature published after 1990, using the key categories of "hospitals," "fires," and "education." As a result, we identified 15 relevant articles that met our inclusion criteria for the review. Results: Of the 15 articles, 12 had adopted a quasi-experimental design and the remaining 3 had employed a true experimental design. The majority of these studies (11 out of 15) were conducted in the United States, with 4 studies forming committees or teams dedicated to education. Simulation methods were used in 13 studies, while 2 studies had employed a combination of methods. All studies focused on first-response procedures based on RACE (Rescue, Alarm, Contain, Extinguish/Evacuation). Outcome measures included the learners' overall experience, performance in the educational settings, and performance in the field, with all studies reporting positive results following the educational interventions. Conclusion: Our review highlights the importance of multi-professional and multi-departmental educational strategies based on institutional-level initiatives for healthcare providers to create a safe hospital environment.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Pharmacy
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.187-199
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• 2015

Background: Singapore has the stable healthcare system with utilizing pharmacist manpower in proper positions by demand of populations' health among Asian countries. Objective: This study aims to systematically review (1) the pharmacists' role and (2) the pharmacy education system of Singapore in comparison with Korea. Method: We searched for information about academic, medical and governmental institutions related to professional pharmacists' practice in Singapore by primarily using database such as DBpia, KISS, Google Scholar and ProQuest and the official website of the Singapore Ministry of Health. We contacted and arranged the visit schedules with National University of Singapore, National Health Group's polyclinics, Agency for Integrated Care, National University Hospital, and community chain pharmacies. During onsite visits, we interviewed pharmacists working in each institution and obtained additional documents and materials relevant to this manuscript work. Results: To become a registered pharmacist in Singapore, the pharmacy curriculum requires four full-time academic years and six additional months allotted for pre-registration training. Pharm.D. course is offered for pharmacy graduate students with additional two full-time years of study. Team teaching and inter professional education program seem the most significant method in pharmacy education. Pharmacists working at hospitals, polyclinics, and community pharmacies in Singapore take broader roles and offer more cognitive services such as smoking cessation program and medication reconciliation. Especially, pharmacists in Agency for Integrated Care fill the role of primary care providers for the continuing care of the community through the governmental support toward the patients-centered integrated care. Conclusion: Singaporean pharmacists take significant and active roles in collaboration with other healthcare providers. Efforts such as interprofessional pharmacy education and governmental endorsement of the systematic and interactive care between pharmacists and other medical providers in Singapore are needed to be urgently applied to Korea healthcare system for the promotion of population health.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Information and Commucation Sciences Conference
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• 2012.10a
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• pp.154-156
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• 2012

This paper presents a user authentication scheme for healthcare application using wireless medical sensor networks, where wireless medical sensors are used for patients monitoring. These medical sensors' sense the patient body data and transmit it to the professionals (e.g., doctors, nurses, and surgeons). Since, the data of an individual are highly vulnerable; it must ensures that patients medical vital signs are secure, and are not exposed to an unauthorized person. In this regards, we have proposed a user1 authentication scheme for healthcare application using medical sensor networks. The proposed scheme includes: a novel two-factor professionals authentication (user authentication), where the healthcare professionals are authenticated before access the patient's body data; a secure session key is establish between the patient sensor node and the professional at the end of user authentication. Furthermore, the analysis shows that the proposed scheme is safeguard to various practical attacks and achieves efficiency at low computation cost.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.307-322
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• 2015

In most democratic countries, influential professional interest groups often become a part of the iron triangle in the policy making process. One of the typical methods by which professional interest groups participate in policy making process may be by having interest group members in the national assembly, who are sympathetic to the group, implementing policies through legislation. In this study we found that from the Constitutional National Assembly through the 18th National Assembly, 147 members of the National Assembly of the Republic of Korea have been ex health care professionals. The research analyzed the roles of these members in health care law amendments as requested by the professional organizations. This study analyzed 11 major cases that involved nullification or amendment of legislations in favor of the healthcare profession, against the basic policies of the government. The study showed that in the 11 major cases, policies were amended in the direction intended by the National Assembly members and other organizations with similar interests, which was against the policy stance of the government. However, these cases did not unilaterally imply that the National Assembly has been captured by the interest groups through the legislators with health care professional background; rather, they should be perceived to be influenced by the exhibited loss of governability by the government in respect to healthcare policy decisions, loss of initiative due to lack of controllability, and reversals and inconsistencies of the policies.

• Journal of The Korea Institute of Healthcare Architecture
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.41-50
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• 2011

This paper assesses the evidence of the built environments' impact on patients' and staff's well-being. It also introduces evidence-based design (EBD) and discusses barriers and solutions for promoting EBD. EBD is an informed approach to design by improving design decisions based on best available knowledge. Designers should provide psychologically and physically supportive environments to promote occupants' well-being. There is increasing evidence that a poorly designed environment elicits negative feelings and stress. Better design will lead to better outcomes especially when it applied to a vulnerable population such as patients, children, and the elderly. Due to high demands of promoting patients' health, healthcare providers and professional designers have been searching for evidence to create healing environments. EBD has been well received in healthcare facilities design and is expanding to other types of environmental design such as educational and commercial design. Design firms should consider EBD as a value-added component of design to meet current and future challenges. It is important for designers to realize that engaging in EBD is not a rejection of creativity, but a means by which to scrutinize their design projects. With critical literature reviews on healing environments, there is sufficient evidence that well-designed environments can promote patients' and medical staff's health outcomes.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Pharmacy
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.71-76
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• 2013

Background (Purpose): The objective of this study was to investigate regulations on pharmacist and other healthcare professional license examination in Korea. Specific aim was focused on the implementation of new regulatory system governing pharmacist license examination particularly on naming of the subjects, method of the examination, and discrimination of pass or fail. Method: Laws and regulations of Korea on the examination system were retrieved from sources posted in Ministry of Government Legislation. Results: Two major regulatory differences were found between pharmacist and other healthcare professionals license examination systems. Firstly, the regulation on pharmacist license examination was ruled by the enforcement ordinance of parent law (Pharmacy Law) while it was ruled by enforcement regulation of parent law (Medical Law). Secondly, minimum grade requirement for pharmacist and other healthcare professionals was differently set up: 40% for each single subject in pharmacist and average of 40% for each group of several subjects in other healthcare professionals. Conclusion: Since pharmacist profession has drastically changed from drug-makers to drug-users during the recent decades, it is desirable to have the regulations on pharmacist license examination system amended in harmony with other laws and regulations of Korea and other major developed countries. Two-step examination for pharmacist license appears worthwhile to implement for balancing the two key functions of the pharmacist being drug-makers and drug-users.