• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
• /
• v.59 no.5
• /
• pp.519-522
• /
• 2021

The Chinese edible frogs, Hoplobatrachus rugulosus (n=20), and the striped snakehead fish, Channa striata (n=34), were purchased from local markets in 3 administrative regions of Cambodia (Phnom Penh, Pursat, and Takeo Provinces) from May 2017 to April 2019, and their infection status with Gnathostoma sp. larvae was investigated. The frogs and fish were transported to the laboratory with ice and examined using the artificial digestion method. Advanced 3rd-stage larvae (AdL₃) of Gnathostoma spinigerum, 24 in total number (1-6 larvae/frog), were detected from 6 (60.0%) out of 10 frogs purchased from Phnom Penh. No gnathostome larvae were detected in 10 frogs purchased from Takeo Province and 34 snakeheads from Phnom Penh, Pursat, and Takeo Provinces. AdL₃ isolated from the frogs were 2.55-3.90 mm long and 0.31-0.36 mm wide. They had a characteristic head bulb (0.081×0.191 mm in average size) with 4 rows of hooklets, a muscular long esophagus (0.950-1.230 mm long), and 2 pairs of cervical sacs (0.530-0.890 mm long). The average number of hooklets in the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th rows was 41, 45, 48, and 51, respectively. These features were consistent with G. spinigerum AdL₃. By the present study, it has been first confirmed that the Chinese edible frog, H. rugulosus, from Phnom Penh serves as a second intermediate host for G. spinigerum, although their intensity of infection was not so high compared to other previously reported localities.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
• /
• v.56 no.6
• /
• pp.531-543
• /
• 2018

Historically, Plasmodium vivax malaria has been one of the most highly endemic parasitic diseases in the Korean Peninsula. Until the 1970s, vivax malaria was rarely directly lethal and was controlled through the Korean Government Program administered by the National Malaria Eradication Service in association with the World Health Organization's Global Malaria Eradication Program. Vivax malaria has re-emerged in 1993 near the Demilitarized Zone between South and North Korea and has since become an endemic infectious disease that now poses a serious public health threat through local transmission in the Republic of Korea. This review presents major lessons learned from past and current malaria research, including epidemiological and biological characteristics of the re-emergent disease, and considers some interesting patterns of diversity. Among other features, this review highlights temporal changes in the genetic makeup of the parasitic population, patient demographic features, and spatial distribution of cases, which all provide insight into the factors contributing to local transmission. The data indicate that vivax malaria in Korea is not expanding exponentially. However, continued surveillance is needed to prevent future resurgence.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
• /
• v.58 no.6
• /
• pp.695-699
• /
• 2020

Present study was performed to know the infection status of Gnathostoma sp. larvae in swamp eels from Cambodia. We purchased total 30 Asian swamp eels, Monopterus albus, from local markets in Pursat and Takeo Provinces and Phnom Penh on May and November 2017 and May 2018. All collected eels were transferred to our laboratory with ice and each of them was examined by artificial digestion method. A total of 15 larval gnathostomes (1-5 larvae) were detected from 55.6% (5/9) swamp eels in Pursat Province. No larval gnathostomes were found in 21 swamp eels in Takeo Province and Phnom Penh. The advanced third-stage larvae (AdL3) detected were 2.575-3.825 (3.250) mm in length and 0.375-0.425 (0.386) mm in width. They had the characteristic head bulb (av. 0.104×0.218 mm) with 4 rows of hooklets, long muscular esophagus (1.048 mm), and 2 pairs of cervical sacs (0.615 mm). The number of hooklets in 4 rows on the head bulb was 41, 44, 47, and 50. In scanning electron microscopy, characteristic features were 4 rows of hooklets on the head bulb, cervical papillae, tegumental spines regularly arranged in transverse striations, and anus. The larval gnathostomes were identified as AdL3 of Gnathostoma spinigerum based on the morphological characters. By the present study, it has been confirmed that G. spinigerum larvae are infected in Asian swamp eels, M. albus, in Pursat Province, Cambodia.

• KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
• /
• v.10 no.8
• /
• pp.3852-3864
• /
• 2016

Patients' health data is very sensitive and the access to individual's health data should be strictly restricted. However, many data consumers may need to use the aggregated health data. For example, the insurance companies needs to use this data to setup the premium level for health insurances. Therefore, privacy-preserving data aggregation solutions for health data have both theoretical importance and application potentials. In this paper, we propose a privacy-preserving health data aggregation scheme using differential privacy. In our scheme, patients' health data are aggregated by the local healthcare center before it is used by data comsumers, and this prevents individual's data from being leaked. Moreover, compared with the existing schemes in the literature, our work enjoys two additional benefits: 1) it not only resists many well known attacks in the open wireless networks, but also achieves the resilience against the human-factor-aware differential aggregation attack; 2) no trusted third party is employed in our proposed scheme, hence it achieves the robustness property and it does not suffer the single point failure problem.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
• /
• v.52 no.1
• /
• pp.21-29
• /
• 2019

Objectives: The Regional Cardiocerebrovascular Center (RCCVC) Project designated local teaching hospitals as RCCVCs, in order to improve patient outcomes of acute cardiocerebrovascular emergencies by founding a regional system that can adequately transfer and manage patients within 3 hours. We investigated the effects of RCCVC establishment on treatment volume and 30-day mortality. Methods: We constructed a panel dataset by extracting all acute myocardial infarction cases that occurred from 2007 to 2016 from the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service claims data, a national and representative source. We then used a panel fixed-effect model to estimate the impacts of RCCVC establishment on patient outcomes. Results: We found that the number of cases of acute myocardial infarction that were treated increased chronologically, but when the time effect and other related covariates were controlled for, RCCVCs only significantly increased the number of treatment cases of female in large catchment areas. There was no statistically significant impact on 30-day mortality. Conclusions: The establishment of RCCVCs increased the number of treatment cases of female, without increasing the mortality rate. Therefore, the RCCVCs might have prevented potential untreated deaths by increasing the preparedness and capacity of hospitals to treat acute myocardial infarction patients.

• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
• /
• v.38 no.6
• /
• pp.472-481
• /
• 2012

Objectives: This study aims to investigate the AD (allergic diseases: asthma, allergic rhinitis and atopic dermatitis) prevalence among elementary schoolchildren in an industrial city, Ulsan, and identify major environmental risk factors associated with AD prevalence. Methods: Data on the physician-diagnosed prevalence over the past 12 months and potential risk factors of AD were collected through a questionnaire from a 2009-2010 survey of 4,067 schoolchildren living in different urban environments. The logistic regression analysis was performed to assess differences in AD prevalence among the areas and to determine which environmental factors impacted AD. Results: Our survey results showed that the AD prevalence rate ranged between 26.2% and 35.9%. Children living in polluted areas (near industrial and central urban areas) had about a 10% higher prevalence of AD than did those living in coastal or suburban residences. The Chi-Square test demonstrated that this local difference was statistically significant before and after adjustment of major confounders such as parental AD history and parental education. The results of the logistic regression analysis showed a statistically significant association between several environmental factors (ventilation in winter, odor conditions and exposure to traffic smoke, and outdoor $PM_{10}/O_3$ pollution) and the prevalence of AD found by multivariate model after adjusting confounders. Conclusion: These results suggest that local differences in AD prevalence are significantly associated with outdoor environmental factors. Although there are likely to be other risk factors for AD, living in a polluted area and exposure to high levels of air pollutants can contribute to an increased risk of childhood AD.

• Journal of Gastric Cancer
• /
• v.17 no.4
• /
• pp.384-393
• /
• 2017

Purpose: The tumor microenvironment is known to be associated with the metabolic activity of cancer cells and local immune reactions. We hypothesized that glucose metabolism measured by 2-deoxy-2-($^{18}F$)fluoro-D-glucose ($^{18}F-FDG$) positron emission tomography (PET)-computed tomography (CT) ($^{18}F-FDG$ PET-CT) would be associated with local immune responses evaluated according to the presence of tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs). Materials and Methods: We retrospectively reviewed 56 patients who underwent $^{18}F-FDG$ PET-CT prior to gastrectomy. In resected tumor specimens, TIL subsets, including cluster of differentiation (CD) 3, CD4, CD8, Forkhead box P3 (Foxp3), and granzyme B, were subjected to immunohistochemical analysis. The prognostic nutritional index (PNI) was calculated as: ($10{\times}serum$ albumin value)+($0.005{\times}peripheral$ lymphocyte counts). Additionally, the maximum standard uptake value ($SUV_{max}$) was calculated to evaluate the metabolic activity of cancer cells. Results: The $SUV_{max}$ was positively correlated with larger tumor size (R=0.293; P=0.029) and negatively correlated with PNI (R=-0.407; P=0.002). A higher $SUV_{max}$ showed a marginal association with higher CD3 (+) T lymphocyte counts (R=0.227; P=0.092) and a significant association with higher Foxp3 (+) T lymphocyte counts (R=0.431; P=0.009). No other clinicopathological characteristics were associated with $SUV_{max}$ or TILs. Survival analysis, however, indicated that neither $SUV_{max}$ nor Foxp3 held prognostic significance. Conclusions: FDG uptake on PET-CT could be associated with TILs, especially regulatory T cells, in gastric cancer. This finding may suggest that PET-CT could be of use as a non-invasive tool for monitoring the tumor microenvironment in patients with gastric cancer.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Integrative Medicine
• /
• v.6 no.4
• /
• pp.15-27
• /
• 2018

Purpose : This study aims to present a rehabilitation exercise and physical education program (REPEP) for local community stroke patients by examining an exercise program provided from traditional physical therapeutic perspectives. Methods : The subjects were 40 stroke patients residing in a local community and managed by a public health center (the group-exercise group: 20, the individual-exercise group: 20). In the case of the group-exercise group (GEG), the subjects were divided into small groups composed of five members each to participate in the program. The individual-exercise group (IEG) took part in the program individually. The subjects received a REPEP that included a warm-up exercise, an elastic band exercise, a leg exercise, a balance and gait exercise, an arm and trunk exercise, and a cool-down exercise twice per week for 20 weeks. They had their gait function, balance index, and muscle strength in the bilateral knee joints tested before and after the experiment. Results : Compared to before the experiment, both groups' gait function, balance index, and muscle strength in the knee joints increased after the experiment. After the experiment, the GEG experienced more improvement in their gait function, balance index, and muscle strength in the bilateral knee joints, excluding their gait velocity and $300^{\circ}/sec$ flexion and extension, than the IEG (p<.05). Conclusion : An exercise program provided from the traditional physical therapeutic perspectives may be applied to stroke patients as their REPEP. In addition, a REPEP was more effective in improving their gait function, balance index, and muscle strength in the knee joints when the subjects formed a group and took part in the program than when they partook in it individually.

• Journal of dental hygiene science
• /
• v.9 no.1
• /
• pp.137-143
• /
• 2009

The purpose of this study was to survey the cause factor and degree of stress experienced by second and third grade students of dental hygiene department in Gyeong-nam province and Ulsan Metropolitan city who were finished two weeks public health center training and four weeks dental hospital and local dental clinical training. It was to provide basic data and improve the problem of clinical training program. 1. In respect of their motives of choosing the hygiene department, 64.8% in second grade and 62.2% in third grade of those respondents cite guarantee of getting a job as main reason. In respect of the satisfaction for major field, 29.6% of second grade and 73.3% of third grade respondents were satisfied. 2. In the satisfaction for clinical training in public health center, 46.3% of second grade and 46.7% of third grade respondents were satisfied. In the satisfaction for clinical training in local dental clinic and hospital, 50.9% of second grade and 66.7% of third grade respondents were satisfied. 3. In the respect of major factor to feel stress in clinical training in public health center, the relation of school practice program and clinical training in public health center, 50.5% of respondents was felt stress because of the difference between school practice program and field condition was exist. 4. In the respect of major factor to feel stress in local dental clinic and hospital training, the relation of school practice program and clinical practice in public health center, 54.5% of respondents were felt stress. 62.1% of respondents were felt stress because of the difference between knowledge and practice. 58.1% of respondents were felt stress because of the difference between school practice program and field condition was exist. 50.5% of respondents were felt stress because of the lack of knowledge in related fields. As the above results, it is necessary to develop clinical practice program that is to increase satisfaction and provide motivation in oder to reduce the stress during clinical training.

• Journal of Convergence for Information Technology
• /
• v.10 no.6
• /
• pp.200-208
• /
• 2020

The purpose of this study was to investigate and compare health, medical and welfare service providers' and local residents' perception on community care. The participants were 68 service providers and 95 local residents. The data were analyzed using independent t-test and chi-square test. The results showed that the degree of agreement of service providers on the need for policy, and visiting services were higher. Service providers' ability to link local residents with a need for care to community resources was higher, but in the activation of self-help group in community, local residents agreed more. In add budget of policy to health insurance, local residents agreed less. In perception on priority for community care policy, high priorities were preparation of financial resources and care culture. To effectively operate community care policy, it is necessary to establish a care culture through active exchanges for reducing differences in policy and opinions of recipients.