• Journal of Convergence for Information Technology
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• v.9 no.6
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• pp.194-201
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• 2019

This cohort study aimed to identify the effects of daily PM10 exposure on the hospital admission of patients with respiratory diseases, during the nine-year period (2002-2010), in Seoul, Korea. The research subjects were 13,974 patients who had been hospitalized with respiratory diseases, including chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), asthma, and pneumonia. During the follow-up period, an increase of 10 ug/m3 in PM10 under the threshold of 50 ug/m3 of PM10 led to hospital admission in 1.38% of the age group younger than 15 years, 1.62% in those 65 years or older, 2.87% in patients 75 years or older and in 1.50% of pneumonia patients, 1.51% of COPD patients, and 1.55% of pneumonia and asthma patients. Under the threshold of 80 ug/m3 of PM10, there was a 3.71% increase in new patients admitted in the age group 65 years or older and 4.25% in those at least 75 years old. Our study found that high PM10 was associated with increased risk of admission of respiratory patients, especially in the elderly. People who already have a respiratory disease should refrain from exposure to particulate matter when there is a high concentration of PM10, especially older patients.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.20 no.11
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• pp.324-334
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• 2019

This study investigates the characteristics of patients hospitalized at a convalescent hospital, by considering patient groups based on their medical record information. It further analyzes and correlates the factors, thus providing basic data required to improve the patient classification system at convalescent hospitals. The data includes total information of 213 medical records of patients discharged from a convalescent hospital in the Jeonbuk region during a period of one year, from January to December 2016. The study examines and correlates the days of hospitalization and the number of diseases, revealing a positive correlation having a correlation coefficient, thereby indicating that infliction with a greater number of diseases results in longer hospitalization. Based on these findings, the study raises the need to revise and supplement items on the patient assessment report to help determine the patient groups and identify medical efforts to be actually provided to patients. In addition, a proper care service system for each patient group based on their respective problems that are intensively managed according to the patient groups will be an essential element in the efficient management of convalescent hospitals. Furthermore, an important task addressed will be in managing the health of the elderly population at the national level.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.3014-3024
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• 2014

This study is to provide basic data for the improvement of nursing services. A survey was done of 135 patients over the age of 65 in a general ward and an attended ward of a hospital in Seoul from December 5 to December 31, 2014 in order to assess their satisfaction with the nursing services. It was found that appropriately staffed nursing services as in attended wards showed greater patients' satisfaction than ordinarily staffed nursing services in general wards(t=3.45, p=.001). Significantly higher satisfaction levels were shown with the nursing services of the attended wards in the subcategories: professional technic(t=2.96, p=.004), training(t=.30, p=.001), and confidence(t=3.79, p<.001). Among the subcategories, confidence was the highest satisfaction factor followed by professional technic and education. The results suggest the need of securing an appropriate number of nursing staff in a ward to enhance patients' satisfaction.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.768-781
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• 1996

The problem of care of patients and families with Alzheimer's disease has become a conscious raising social policy issue in Korea. The government of the Republic of Korea has become cognizant of the situation and has begun searching for ways to remedy it. Thus, there is a need for a comprehensive under-standing of the situation in which patients and their families are struggling and the enormous problems of care. With a realization of the urgent need, this study was done to investigate the situation and the care needs of families with patients with Alzheimer's Disease, and to compare the effectiveness of services utilized by the families in terms of cost and effects on patient's conditions and on family live. The Subjects for the study were 29 families with hospitalized patients, 25 families utilizing hospital outpatient clinics, 14 families utilizing day care facilities, and 16 families with homebound patients. A total of 84 families were interviewed by four trained interviewers using structured and semistructured questionnaires. The data produced from these interviews included : the patient's stage of Alzheimer's disease, patient's bizarre behavior, hours spent on patient care per day, family burden and quality of life, direct and indirect costs encountered in the care of patients, and the families' evaluation of the effectiveness of the services received. The data were analyzed to determine the relationships between family charactersistics, patient's conditions and services utilization. The effectiveness of each of the service entities was assessed through families evaluation and hoped for service and comparisons were made between services in terms of the cost-effectiveness ratios. After initial comparison of cost-effectiveness ratios, further analysis was done to compare between groups for incremental effectiveness for each incremental unit of cost to determine the most cost-effective service entities. The findings of the study are as fellows : 1. The choice of living arrangement and the types of services are a function of the stage of Alzheimer's condition and the economic status of the family. 2. Comparision of the cost of care showed that most expenses were encountered in by families with hospitalization, families using outpatient services, and families using day care services in that order. The least expense was involved in the care of homebound patients. The economic burden felt by families was in the same order as expenses. 3. The average number of hours spent on daily patient care was 9.9 hours for the outpatient clinic users, 9.7 hours for homebound patients, and 5.4 hours for day care users. 4. There were significant differences in the patient's conditions (CDRL), bizarre behaviors and the families's burden by living arrangement and /or types of service. However, no significant difference was found between groups in the family's quality of life. 5. The families rated the services of day care center as most effective for the care of the patients and families, except for a few families who had experienced some improvement in the patient's conditions. The outpatient clinic users expressed psychological comforts mainly in that the patient was being taken care of. For those hospitalized patients, families expressed the comfort of being relieved of the burden of care and that the patient is being professionally cared for. Form the analysis of the costs, hours of patient care, patient's bizarre behaviors, family's quality of life and burdens, and family's evaluation of services, it is concluded that up to the mid stage of Alzheimer's condition, the utilization of day care center services is found to be the most cost-effective, and toward the end stage of the Alzheimer's disease, it is hoped that there will be a establishment of long term or short term in-patient facilities for the protection of patients and preservation of the integrity of families for less cost. Thus. it was concluded that the family centered system of care is the most effective for Korea with systematic support systems developed for the care of patients and their families according to the needs of families as the patient's condition deteriorates.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.327-337
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• 2017

The purpose of this study is to identify the current state of paid care services and to identify the factors that affect the utilization of private nursing services. This study constructed and utilized the Korean Health Panel data (2011-2014) in the form of panel data, and selected 5,110 patients who had experience using one or more hospitalization services per year. STATA 12.0 SE was used for data processing and analysis of this study. Frequency analysis was performed to confirm basic characteristics of hospitalized patients. Cross-analysis and t-test were conducted to confirm the status of paid care services according to characteristics. Respectively. Finally, panel logistic regression was performed by applying a hierarchical method to stepwise modeling the three categories of Andersen's Behavioral Model to identify factors affecting the use of paid care services for inpatients. The results showed that the use of paid nursing services was higher in women, elderly, long - term hospitalized and disabled. On the other hand, significant household income variables in private employment did not show significant results. The results of this study are expected to be used as basic data for the selection of the nursing care integrated services under discussion. In addition, detailed discussions on the selection of subjects should be made in the future.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.8 no.12
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• pp.119-127
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• 2017

This paper convergent examined caregiver burden, depressive symptoms and health related quality of life of 226 caregivers of stroke patients, who had been hospitalized in 7 general hospitals located in Cheongju and Daejeon Metropolitan city. The quality of life was measured using SF-8, which is a short version of HRQoL. According to Multiple regression Analysis, dependence of a patient were important factors in the physical related quality of life. These results suggest that in order to improve the quality of life related to the physical health of the stroke patient's caregiver, the elderly long-term care insurance system and the caregiver system and the ward of the Ministry of Health and Welfare are expanded ward without a caregiver. There is a need to raise expectations for recovery through education and family support groups.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Pharmacy
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.153-159
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• 2012

Licorice is a very useful herbal medicine frequently prescribed, but glycyrrhizin, one of its components, can cause pseudoaldosteronism presenting hypokalemia, metabolic alkalosis and hypertension as a result of prolonging a biological half-life of systemic steroid by strongly inhibiting the enzyme $11{\beta}$-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase type 2. The risk factors for this side effect are still unclear. Here, 479 hospitalized patients taking herbal medicines including licorice for more than five days were recruited to analyze their serum potassium levels, under following parameters ; age and gender of patient, dose and period of licorice, disease state such as hypertension and with or without diuretics. They were divided into the non-occurrence group (over 3.5 mEq/L) and the occurrence group (under 3.5 mEq/L) of hypokalemia based on serum potassium levels during hospitalization. The average ages of the non-occurrence group and the occurrence group were $52.6{\pm}17.8$ and $68{\pm}10.5$, respectively (p < 0.001). But there were no noticeable differences in the daily dose of licorice, days of taking, and total dose between groups. Regression analysis showed that odd ratio of age (>60) and taking diuretics inducing hypokalemia was 3.5 (95%CI 1.5-8.1), 4.6 (95%CI 2.0-10.9) that indicates significant correlation with hypokalemia. Based upon this analysis, it is imperative to monitor regularly the risk of pseudoaldosteronism or hypokalemia not only when administered licorice of high dose for long period but also when combined it with diuretics causing hypokalemia to the elderly patients over 60 year old.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.9 no.8
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• pp.77-85
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• 2018

Dementia among the diseases occurring in the old age is recognized as a disease to be solved at the national level and systematic management is being carried out. However, the awareness and response of the mild cognitive disorder, which is the middle stage of normal aging and dementia, are insufficient and social costs are increasing every year. The subjects of the study were 303 hospitalized patients whose primary diagnosis was mild cognitive impairment (F067) in a nursing hospital located in one district in 2016. The number of days of hospitalization was shorter in autumn and longer in winter or in hospital discharge. The cost of treatment for patients with mild cognitive impairment is lower in autumn and higher in winter or in 'discharge' of medical treatment results. The total cost of medical treatment was high in the winter by season in the ADL 6-12 and ADL 13-20 groups. Difference in the cost of medical treatment according to the characteristics of medical treatment, the medical expenses were the highest when the number of corporal disease was 5 ~ 8. In the medical treatment results, the ADL 6-12 point group and the ADL 13-20 point group had high medical expenses in 'continue'. Considering the clinical characteristics of mild cognitive impairment and considering that 10-15% of the patients with mild cognitive impairment progress to dementia every year, early detection and treatment of mild cognitive impairment is an effective and potentially important task for reducing potential social and dementia patients.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Laboratory Science
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• v.53 no.3
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• pp.208-216
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• 2021

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). This study aimed to investigate the status of renal function in patients with COVID-19. The study surveyed a total of 649 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 at a hospital located in southern Gyeonggi Province, South Korea over a one month period in January 2021. The parameters analyzed were blood urea nitrogen (BUN), creatinine, sodium, potassium, chloride, and estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR). The BUN and creatinine of the COVID-19 patients were found to be higher than the normal reference range, specially in males, and in the elderly (60s and 80s or older). The serum electrolyte levels of the patients were observed to be within the reference intervals. Of the subjects, males over 80 years of age had a Chronic Kidney Disease Epidemiology Collaboration (CKD-EPI) of 60 mL/min/1.73 m² or less. Recent research suggests that some severe cases of COVID-19 are showing signs of kidney damage, even in those with no prior underlying kidney disease. Thus, assessment of kidney function using multiple indicators could help diagnose abnormal renal function in patients with COVID-19.

• Journal of Society of Occupational Therapy for the Aged and Dementia
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.47-55
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• 2018

Objective : The purpose of this study is to consider the change of hand function according to the quality of sleep and to find out a correlation among the quality of sleep and hand function, and sleep disturbing factors. Method : 23 patients who were hospitalized more than 6 months from Nov. 2017 to Jan. 2018 were tested for the quality of sleep used by sleep quality scale, for the grip strength used by a dynamometer, and for the coordination used by BBT and 9-Hole Peg test. The collected data were analyzed to implement the paired t-test and Pearson correlation coefficient. Result : In the high grade group of sleep score, the quality of sleep & BBT, and the grip strength & BBT have correlated each other; and in the medium group, only the latter has shown a correlation. In both groups, the quality of sleep and the sleep pattern have showed significant high correlation. Conclusion : When the elderly in geriatric hospitals show qualitative differences, BBT and the combination of treatment for the improvement of grip strength can improve the quality of sleep. And the sleep pattern intervention is considered to be effective to improve the quality of sleep.