• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.55 no.1
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• pp.1-7
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• 2017

Cutaneous leishmaniasis (CL) caused by Leishmania donovani is an endemic vector-borne disease in Sri Lanka. Over 2,500 cases have been reported since 2000 and the number of CL cases has dramatically increased annually. Total 57 clinically suspected CL patients attending the dermatology clinic in Anuradhapura Teaching Hospital were recruited from January to June 2015. Slit skin smears and skin biopsies were taken from each of the subjects. Clinical and epidemiological data were obtained using interviewer administered questionnaire. Forty-three (75.4%) patients among 57 were confirmed positive for L. donovani. The majority (77%) of infected patients was males, and the most affected age group was 21-40 years. Soldiers in security forces, farmers, and housewives were identified as high risk groups. The presence of scrub jungles around the residence or places of occupation (P=0.003), the presence of sandflies (P=0.021), and working outsides more than 6 hr per day (P=0.001) were significantly associated with CL. The number of lesions ranged from 1-3, and the majority (76%) of the patients had a single lesion. Upper and lower extremities were the prominent places of lesions, while the wet type of lesions were more prevalent in females (P=0.022). A nodular-ulcerative type lesion was common in both sexes. The presence of sandflies, scrub jungles, and outdoor activities contributed to spread of Leishmania parasites in an endemic pattern. Implementation of vector control programs together with health education with regard to transmission and prevention of CL are necessary to control the spread of this infection.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.96-114
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• 1994

This study was carried out to describe and analyze experimental studies conducted in graduates nursing degree. Of 170 experimental studies conducted during the past three decades between 1962 and August 1991, 150 studies were available, including 124 master’s and 26 doctoral theses. This study examined their general characteristics and detailed research methods using percentiles. The results were as follows 1. Most of the studies adopted a quasi-experimental design. 2. The subjects of the studies were chosen by convenience sampling except for two studies whose subjects were drawn by randomization. Studies comparing experimental and control groups were in the highest proportion and the most frequent sample sizes of each group were 21 to 30 for both experimental and control groups. 3. As to measurement, physiological measures were most frequent followed by psychsociological measures and active report questionnaires. Each study, on average, adopted two kind of measurement tools. Studies in which the data collection period was of 1~2 months were in the highest pro-portion. 4. All doctoral theses and 67.0% of master’s theses examined specific research hypotheses. Of these studies, the results of 92.5% supported the hypotheses. 5. Parametric statistics were the major analytical methods. In particular, t-test was used most frequently followed by Chi square, F-test, and Pearson Correlation Coefficients. 6. Patients were the most frequent study subjects. Frequent nursing interventions were information and education followed by support, distraction, and nursing treatments. 7. With regards to the dependent variables, “feelings” such as anxiety, pain, and depression were most frequent. In addition “exchanging” such as restoring, metabolism, cardiopulmonary function, infection and vital signs were adopted as the dependent variables in 29.1％ of the studies examined, while 12.3% of the studies selected “choosing” such as stress, health behavior, or role performance.

• Journal of agricultural medicine and community health
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.10-21
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• 1976

The traditional application of night soil to vegetable gardens and rice paddies results in a most wide spread condition of parasitism, with a variety of helminths found in Korea. In addition to the above fact, the peculiar habit of the consumption of raw vegetables, fish, crustaceans and mammals provides a means of infestations of helminths. During the last sixty years numerous reports were found on the prevalence of helminths amongst the Korean population in different parts of the country, and it was generally recognized that ascariasis, hookworm disease, filariasis, clonorchiasis and paragonimiasis constitute the important helminthic disease in Korea. In practical measures of parasite control activities the main measures are summarized as mass-treatment, night-soil disposal and transmission control. Among the three, the mass-treatment has been commonly applied, however, no reduction of transmission has been obtained by treatment of a population. Therefore, the ultimate eradication of parasites will depend upon the application of comprehensive environmental sanitation measures. The basic environmental measures will be concerned with (a) the safe disposal of human excreta, (b) the provision of adequate and safe water supplies in such a way as to promote a higher standard of personal hygiene in the population, and (c) the prevention of food contamination by faecal material. Additional environmental measures will deal with the improvement of housing and housing hygiene and with general community development. Community development means social and cultural as well as economic development. The control measures on the parasitic endemic diseases, such as clonorchiasis and paragonimiasis are the good examples for community health development in Korea. The control of Clonorchis and Paragonimus infections are theoretically very simple, as the infection can only invade the human body by way of encysted metacercaria which are taken into the body when eating passive intermediate hosts(fishes, crabs and crayfishes). Although prophylactic measures in the case of the infections deal with above merely consist the fishes in cooking or submerging in hot water before eating them, it is exceedingly difficult to carry out such simple measures in face of century old traditions, to which the relatively primitive population clings with great tenacity. There is no one universally applicable method of control. The choice of methods must be dictated by the nature of the environment. the habit and custom of the people. the pattern of transmission and the resources of the country. There must exist a well organized public health infrastructure. Since a control programme is of necessity on a longterm basis and continuity in its implementation is essential. An investigation should be made on the prevalence of the diseases and its relationships to irrigation engineering, freshwater ecology, agricultural methods, hydro-electric schemes, and the development of communities in affected areas. In conclusion, however. the control of clonorchiasis and paragonimiasis in Korea is not an impossible task. A combination of efforts with major emphasis on health education and mass chemotherapy coupled with governmental aid in enforcing legislative public health measures could reduce the diseases. Health education in particular attempts following four things: (a) It supplies a person with enough general knowledge about a disease to make the preventive measures. (b) It makes a person feel sufficiently about the importance of his own health to make him alter his behavior and adopt these preventive measure. (c) It makes him concerned for the health others. (d) It tries to make him feel so strongly about the first three that be supports and even initiates preventive action by the community. Educational efforts should be directed primarily toward school children because it is during the early years that most persons become infected, and also because children are less entrenched in their food habits so that, the educational process should be involved at various levels in successive changes of knowledge, attitude, beha viour, habit and custom of their lives. The most parasitic endemic diseases are related to community diseases. In caring for a sick community. the first stage is to gather epidemiological data, the next is to make inferences from it-to make the community diagnosis. The third is to prescribe community treatment or community health action part of a community health action programme. The community health action is the sum of the steps decided upon to remedy the critical features revealed by the community diagnosis. Action takes various forms; health education is the most important.

• Journal of agricultural medicine and community health
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.205-211
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• 2005

Objectives: In Ulleung island, many people was suffered from dermatomycosis. But many patients was not recognized to dermatomycosis due to little symptom. So, public health education was needed. We will plan education direction based on evidence. So, in one way, the recognition level was needed to determine education direction. Methods: From June to July in 2005, 45 patients was made a question. The questionnaire was composed of chief complaint, site, duration, similar disease in family, 5 questiones and so on. If patients was recognized to 1 question, 1 score was added. Remain 4 question was done in same manner. Results: The low score group were that total socre was beyond 2. And The high score group were that total score was above 3. The low score group was 24 persons, average age was 59. The high score group was 21 persons and average age was 42. Male and female ratio was 7 : 17 in low score group and 10 : 11 in high score group. Coinfection was 17 patients in low score group and 2 patients in high score group. There was only 17 patients that wete recognized that dermatomycosis and "Moozom" were same disease. And, many patients was not recognized to possibility of reinfection after treatment of dermatomycosis. Conclusions: In Ulleung island, coinfection rate was higher than other area bacause of low recognition level. And infection rate in family was higher too. So, there was essential to educate of dermatomycosis prevention. Dermatomycosis patient became older and was more female than other area, so there was need to centralize people to be needed of public health education. Finally, many statistical study for dermatomycosis should be needed for many patients and general populations in Ulleung island.

• Pediatric Infection and Vaccine
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.113-121
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• 2024

Purpose: In response to the surge in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) omicron variant cases, we have implemented preemptive testing for preschool and school. The purpose is to quickly detect COVID-19 cases using a rapid antigen test (RAT) kit so that normal school activities can continue. Methods: The results entered in The Healthcare Self-Test App were merged with the information on the status of confirmed cases in the COVID-19 Information Management System by Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) for preschool and school of students and staffs March 2 to May 1, 2022 to analyze the RAT positive rate and positive predictive value of RAT. Results: In preschool and school 19,458,575 people were tested, weekly RAT positive rate ranged from 1.10% to 5.90%, positive predictive value of RAT ranged from 86.42% to 93.18%. By status, RAT positive rate ranged from 1.13% to 6.16% for students, 0.99% to 3.93% for staffs, positive predictive value of RAT ranged from 87.19% to 94.03% for students, 77.55% to 83.10% for staffs. RAT positive rate by symptoms ranged from 76.32% to 88.02% for those with symptoms and 0.34% to 1.11% for those without symptoms. As a result of preschool and school RAT, 943,342 confirmed cases were preemptively detected, before infection spread in preschool and school. Conclusions: RAT was well utilized to detect confirmed cases at an early stage, reducing the risk of transmission to minimize the educational gap in preschool and school. To compensate for the limitations of RAT, further research should continue to reevaluate the performance of RAT as new strains of viruses continue to emerge. We will have to come up with various ways to utilize it, such as performing periodic and repeated RAT and parallel polymerase chain reaction.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.213-220
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• 1990

The employees at the Pohang industrial area, where Clonarchis sinensis has been known to be endemic along the Hyungsan River, were examined parasitologically for clonorchiasis and a part of the infected cases were surveyed with a questionaire to outline the recent infection status of C. sinensis and epidemiological parameters in the area. Total of 3, 180 cases were tested by intra- dermal inoculation of C. sinensis antigen (Green Cross Co., Korea), and 834(26.2%) were found positive. Out of the positive cases, 598 were subjected to (ecal examination for helminth ova. The examination revealed 129(21.6%) ova Positive cases of C. sinensis, and Trichuris trichiura 1.7%, Ascaris lumbricoides 0.3%, and Metagonimus yokogawai 0.2%. The questionaire analysis showed some significant difFerences between the infected and non-infected(control) groups. The infected cases were less educated than the control, and they lived at the closer area to the river, and most of them lived there over 20 years. Also they preferred eating raw fresh water fish. Most of the detected cases were treated with prasiquantel and found negative for the eggs in 85.3% of them 1 year after the treatment. The present data reveal markedly decreased endemicity of clonorchiasis compared with previous prevalence rates but still clonorchiasis is endemic in the Hyungsan river basin. A comprehensive measure including case detection, treatment and education for parasite control should be applied to control clonorchiasis in such endemic areas.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.425-430
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• 2005

Objectives : To investigate the prevalence of Clonorchis Sinensis infestation and to determine the associated risk factors among a population in a part of the rural area of Gyeongsangnam-do, Korea, which is an area known to have a high mortality from liver cancer and a high infection of C. sinensis. Methods : The study populat ion consisted of those people who have lived in rural areas and who were over 40 years old. This study was performed in 5 areas during the period from 1999 to 200 3. Informed consents were obtained from the 2,381 study participants, and these people were interviewed about their life style habits with using the structured questionnaire that was administered by trained staff members. The subjects underwent blood sampling and their stool specimens were examined by using the Formalin-ether sedimentation technique. Results : Among the study subjects (N=2,381), the positivity for C. sinensis in the stool was 34.4% (95% CI=36.3-42.5); it was 39.4% (95% CI=36.3-42.5) in the males and 30.9% (95% CI=28.5-33.3) in the females . The positivity for C. sinensis was associated with current alcohol drinking (odds ratio=1.8, 95% CI: 1.5-2.1) and raw fish consumption (odds ratio 1.2, 95% CI: 0.9-1.6). Conclusion : The present study confirmed the high prevalence of C. sinensis in the study subjects. It is necessary to establish consistent medical management and education programs for the treatment and prevention of C. sinensis infestation in the rural inhabitants of Korea.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.51 no.6
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• pp.727-733
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• 2013

Despite the existence of effective anthelmintics, parasitic infections remain a major public health problem in Southeast Asia, including Thailand. In rural communities, continuing infection is often reinforced by dietary habits that have a strong cultural basis and by poor personal hygiene and sanitation. This study presents a survey of the prevalence of intestinal parasitic infections among the people in rural Thailand. The community-based cross-sectional study was conducted in villages in Khon Kaen Province, northeastern Thailand, from July to August 2013. A total of 253 stool samples from 102 males and 140 females, aged 2-80 years, were prepared using formalin-ethyl acetate concentration methods and examined using light microscopy. Ninety-four individuals (37.2%) were infected with 1 or more parasite species. Presence of parasitic infection was significantly correlated with gender (P=0.001); nearly half of males in this survey (49.0%) were infected. Older people had a higher prevalence than younger members of the population. The most common parasite found was Opisthorchis viverrini (26.9%), followed by Strongyloides stercoralis (9.5%), Taenia spp. (1.6%), echinostomes (0.4%), and hookworms (0.4%). The prevalence of intestinal protozoa was Blastocystis hominis 1.6%, Entamoeba histolytica 0.8%, Entamoeba coli 0.8%, Balantidium coli 0.4%, Iodamoeba b$\ddot{u}$tschlii 0.4%, and Sarcocystis hominis 0.4%. Co-infections of various helminths and protozoa were present in 15.9% of the people. The present results show that the prevalence of parasitic infections in this region is still high. Proactive education about dietary habits, personal hygiene, and sanitation should be provided to the people in this community to reduce the prevalence of intestinal parasite infections. Moreover, development of policies and programs to control parasites is needed.

• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.41-54
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• 1985

This study was conducted for the improvement of milk quality and milk hygiene in public health point of view. Investigation of mastiris infection rate, isolation and identification of causative microorganisms in CMT positive milk, investigation of milk contamination level by measuring the bacteria and soma tic cell counts and investigation of dairy management in farms were performed on 1.605 quarters milk of 434 cows of 20 dairy farms in Gyunggi-area from September 1983 to March 1984. The results were summarized as follows 1. Sixteen (3.7%) of 434 cows were found to be infected with clinical mastiris. 234 (53.9%) of 434 cows and 608(37.9%) of 1, 605 quarters were found to be infected with subclinical mastiris. 2. The causative microorganisms isolated were Staphylococcus aureus (38.3%), Staphylococcus epidermidis(21.0%), Micrococci(13.6%), Streptococcus spp. (12.3%), E. coli (7.4%), Fungus & Yeast (1.6%) and others (5.8%). 3. Total numbers of bacteria were $9.2{\times}10^6$ to $1.21{\times}10^7/ml$(av. $1.805{\times} 10^7/ml$), numbers of coliform bacteria were $4.1{\times} 10^5$ to $9.4{\times} 10^5$/ml(av. $7.05{\times} 10^5$/ml) and somatic cell counts were $4.8{\times} 10^5$ to $1.52{\times} 10^6$ cells/ml (av. $9.5{\times} 10^5$cells/ml) in bulk milk. 4. As comparing with CMT score of +, ++ and +++, somatic cell counts were $3.4{\times} 10^5$ to $1.64{\times} 10^6$ cells/ml (av. $6.41{\times} 10^5$cells/ml), $5.4{\times} 10^5$ to $2.75{\times} 10^6$ cells/ml(av. $1.762{\times} 10^6$cells/ml) and $1.97{\times} 10^6$ to $9.75{\times} 10^6$ cells/ml(av. $7.781{\times} 10^6$cells/ml), respectively. 5. In investigation on dairy management, performance of dry cow therapy, teat dipping after milking, disinfection of milking machine at every milking, replacement of milk liner within 6months and opportunity of acquirement for the mastiris control techniques by dairy education were 65%, 40%, 45%, 55% and 50% in 20 dairy farms, respectively.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.89-99
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• 2001

Objectives : To describe the characteristics of a mumps epidemic in Cheju-do, 1998 and to identify the risk factors associated with mumps infection. Methods : To estimate attack rate, previously collected data from the Nationally Notifiable Communicable Disease Reporting System and School Health Reporting System, temporarily administered by Division of Education. as well as additional surveillance data were used. In order to identify the clinical characteristics and risk factors associated with mumps, we conducted a questionnaire survey in 17 schools (9 elementary, 4 middle, and 4 high schools) among a population that included healthy students. Results : From March 3 to August 31, 2,195 cases of mumps were identified, and patients under 20 years of age accounted for 2,162 cases (attack rate 13.2, 95% CI 12.6-13.7/1,000). The attack rate for the population under 20 years of age was the highest in Nam county (44.7/1,000), nod in the 7-12 years old sub-group(>20.0/1,000). There was no sexual difference. 80.5% and 59.7% of patients presented periauricular and submandibular swelling respectively. Aseptic meningitis was a complication in 2.9% of cases, orchitis in 1.3%, epididymitis in 0.9% and oophoritis in 0.6% respectively. The overall MMR vaccination rate was 59.1% and it decreased in accordance with increasing age. In students aged 10 years old or below, household contact and MMR vaccination status was significantly associated with infection, and only among students with household contact, the risk of one dose MMR(OR=10.22, 95% CI 2.92-35.78) and non-vaccination (OR=11.62, 95% CI 1.96-68.96) was significantly greater when. compared with that of two dose vaccination. Among students aged 11 years old or above, household contact history was significantly associated and MMR vaccination status was not associated. Conclusions : Low vaccination rate and vaccine failure were thought to predispose the population for this large outbreak. To prevent sustained mumps outbreaks, a second MMR vaccination should be encouraged and catch up vaccinations should be given to elderly children who remain susceptible.