• YAKHAK HOEJI
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• v.59 no.3
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• pp.127-134
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• 2015

The aim of this study was to investigate the correlation among age, symptoms and initial medication (IM), and the tolerance duration of IM in Korean people with Parkinson's disease (PD). We studied 60 patients with untreated early PD who were initially diagnosed in our hospital between Jun 2006 and Sep 2014. We collected data on sex, age at diagnosis, symptom duration until diagnosis, main motor symptoms, frequency and duration of IM through electronic medical records. We divided patients into groups depending on the number of drugs (MONO/COMBI) and whether to contain dopaminergic property (DOPA/NDOPA). We analyzed the correlation between age and symptoms in each two groups and calculated the mean tolerance duration of IM in each of the groups. The mean symptom duration until diagnosis was 12.2 months. The most frequent drug was levodopa formulations (80%) compared to dopamine agonists (58.3%). The number of patients in the COMBI group (63.3%) was more than that in the MONO group (36.7%). Half of the patients in the COMBI group were taking LDF+DA (50%). Except for tremor, no other symptom showed a significant correlation between with IM. The mean tolerance duration of IM was within 200 days. The mean duration for COMBI group (342.7 days) was longer than that for MONO group (209.8 days). Among regimens, the mean tolerance duration of DOPA group (293.3 days) was longer than for NDOPA group (251.4 days). There was no difference in survival curves between any of the two groups. We found that patients experienced symptoms for over a year in Korea. This indicates that diagnosis time is faster than reported in other previous studies. The longest tolerance duration among IM was for dopaminergic combination therapy. More research is needed to design the most appropriate treatment for PD in Korean patients.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.41 no.6
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• pp.655-661
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• 2022

Since speech impairment is prevalent in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD), speech recognition systems suitable for these patients are needed. In this paper, we propose a speech recognition system that effectively recognizes the speech of patients with PD. The speech recognition system is firstly pre-trained with the Globalformer using the speech data from healthy people, and then fine-tuned using relatively small amount of speech data from the patient with PD. For this analysis, we used the speech dataset of healthy people built by AI hub and that of patients with PD collected at Inha University Hospital. As a result of the experiment, the proposed speech recognition system recognized the speech of patients with PD with Character Error Rate (CER) of 22.15 %, which was a better result compared to other methods.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Pharmacy
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.285-292
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• 2018

Background: Long-term levodopa therapy relieves the motor dysfunction associated with Parkinson's disease (PD), but has various effects on non-motor symptoms, including cognitive dysfunction, hallucinations, and affective disorders, and can exacerbate certain aspects of dementia-like cognitive dysfunction. Here, we investigated the relationship between levodopa treatment and development of dementia in patients with PD. Methods: This retrospective study analyzed 76 consecutive patients with PD who had taken levodopa between 2011 and 2015. The participants were initially free of dementia and had initial daily levodopa doses of below 600 mg. Patients who did and did not develop comorbid dementia were compared in terms of potential predictor variables, including PD onset age, sex, levodopa doses, and non-dementia comorbidities. Results: Of the 76 patients, 21 (27.6%) developed dementia, which was followed by hallucinations and insomnia. The independent predictors of incident dementia were PD onset age and second-year and third-year average levodopa doses that were higher than the first-year average levodopa dose. Patients who developed dementia had significantly higher average daily levodopa doses and levodopa dose increases over the 6-year treatment period than those who did not develop dementia. In addition, patients with higher levodopa doses were more likely to experience hallucinations. Conclusion: These results suggest that increases in levodopa doses may be associated with a greater risk of cognitive impairment in patients with PD. Therefore, motor and cognitive functions and levodopa dose increases should be evaluated regularly during long-term levodopa therapy in patients with PD.

• BMB Reports
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• v.56 no.5
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• pp.308-313
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• 2023

Phenotypic features such as ataxia and loss of motor function, which are characteristics of Parkinson's disease (PD), are expected to be very closely related to cerebellum function. However, few studies have reported the function of the cerebellum. Since the cerebellum, like the cerebrum, is known to undergo functional and morphological changes due to neuroinflammatory processes, elucidating key functional factors that regulate neuroinflammation in the cerebellum can be a beneficial therapeutic approach. Therefore, we employed PD patients and MPTP-induced PD mouse model to find cytokines involved in cerebellar neuroinflammation in PD and to examine changes in cell function by regulating related genes. Along with the establishment of a PD mouse model, abnormal shapes such as arrangement and number of Purkinje cells in the cerebellum were confirmed based on histological finding, consistent with those of cerebellums of PD patients. As a result of proteome profiling for neuroinflammation using PD mouse cerebellar tissues, fetuin-A, a type of cytokine, was found to be significantly reduced in Purkinje cells. To further elucidate the function of fetuin-A, neurons isolated from cerebellums of embryos (E18) were treated with fetuin-A siRNA. We uncovered that not only the population of neuronal cells, but also their morphological appearances were significantly different. In this study, we found a functional gene called fetuin-A in the PD model's cerebellum, which was closely related to the role of cerebellar Purkinje cells of mouse and human PD. In conclusion, morphological abnormalities of Purkinje cells in PD mice and patients have a close relationship with a decrease of fetuin-A, suggesting that diagnosis and treatment of cerebellar functions of PD patients might be possible through regulation of fetuin-A.

• Korean Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.582-591
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• 2008

Both genetic and environmental factors play important roles in the pathogenesis of Parkinson Disease(PD). The contribution of many environmental factors including dietary factor remains unproven. The purpose the study was to investigate the dietary habits, nutrient intake and dietary quality of Korean PD patients according to the duration of disease. PD patients were recruited from K and S university hospitals from May 2005 to January 2006. This study was carried out after approval by the Institute Review Board(IRB). British Brain Bank criteria was used to diagnose PD. The subjects were classified into 2 groups based on the duration of PD: <25 months and $\geq$25 months groups. General characteristics, anthropometric measurements, food habits and dietary intakes were investigated. The results of this study were as follows: 1) The mean age of <25 months group($66.9{\pm}8.0$ yr) was significantly higher than that of $\geq$25 months group($62.2{\pm}8.8$ yr)(p<0.05). No significant differences were found for academic background, occupation, living status and social activity, however, numbers of diseases, exercise and family history of PD were significantly different. 2) Anthropometric measurements were not different between the two groups. 3) The frequency of taking snacks was significantly higher in <25 months group and the amounts of alcohol consumption were significantly higher in $\geq$25 months group. 4) Daily intakes of most nutrients were very low compared with DRI. 5) The MAR score was significantly lower in <25 months group(p<0.05;) however, the scores of DVS, DDS and DQI were not significantly different. As a conclusion an overall nutrient intake and dietary quality of the Parkinson's Disease patients need to be improved regardless of duration of the disease and a well-balanced diet should be emphasized.

• Journal of Korean Neurosurgical Society
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• v.30 no.8
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• pp.976-980
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• 2001

Objectives : For Parkinsonian patients who had not reacted favorably on drug therapy are good candidate for ventroposterolateral pallidotomy, although not curative. We studied these patients after unilateral pallidotomy, to confirm the effectiveness and safety of this procedure. Methods : We evaluated the 17 patients with idiopathic Parkinson's diesease who had undergone unilateral posteroventral pallidotomy. All patients responded to levodopa initially. Mean age was 55 years(38-75years), and mean duration of disease was 9.8 years(3-20years). Pre-and postoperative evaluation at 3 month intervals included Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating scale(UPDRS) scoring, Hoehn and Yahr(H & Y) staging, and neuropsychological examinations. Results : Pallidotomy significantly improved parkinsonian symptom(tremor, rigidity, bradykinesia, dyskinesia, sensory symptom). Nine of 10 patients who showed dyskinesia preoperatively significant improvement. The mean dose of levodopa in 9 patients was lowered. The mean H & Y score and UPDRS score were improved in on and/or off time in 15 patients. Among patients who were not improved, one patient worsened, and the others showed no change. The mean overall UPDRS off score changed from 76 preoperatively to 44(33%) at 6 months and from 70 to 52(25%) at 1 year. Transient surgical morbidity was showen in four patients and included dysarthria, hypotonia and confusion. Conclusion : We conclude that pallidotomy is safe and effective in patients who have levodopa-reponsive parkinsonism with severe symptom fluctuation. Unilateral pallidotomy also considered helpful to ipsilateral symptom. Unilateral pallidotomy can improve all of parkinsonian's symptom and allow to reduce the levodopa medication. Most of patients show satisfactory results.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.59 no.3
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• pp.674-677
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to analyze bradykinesia of forearm movement in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) as compared to those of normal subjects. A gyrosensor was selected for the measurement of forearm movement, because it can provide angular velocity signal which is free from the gravitational artifact and also because it can be conveniently used during clinical test of bradykinesia. Forty PD patients (age: $65.7\pm11.1$ yrs, H&Y stage:$2.3\pm0.5$), 14 age-matched elderly subjects ($65\pm3.9$ yrs) and 17 healthy young subjects ($24\pm2.1$ yrs) participated in this study. Angular velocity during forearm movement of pronation/supination was measured in both arms. Suggested quantitative measures of bradykinesia were root-mean-squared (RMS) angular velocity, RMS angle, peak power and total power which were derived from the angular velocity. ANOVA showed that all measures were significantly different among three groups (p<0.001). Subsequent post-hoc test revealed that all measures in PD patients were significantly smaller than in healthy elderly and healthy young subjects (p<0.05). This results suggest that PD patients can be differentiated from normal subjects using suggested measures.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.240-244
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• 2010

The purpose of this study is to compare finger tapping (FT) movement of patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) with normal subjects. A gyrosensor system was used for the measurement of FT movement, because it provides angular velocity free from the gravitational artifact and it can be used during clinical FT test listed in unified PD rating scale (UPDRS). Forty PD patients (age: 65.7 ${\pm}$ 11.1 yrs, H&Y stage:2.3 ${\pm}$ 0.5), 14 age-matched elderly subjects (65${\pm}$3.9 yrs) and 17 healthy young subjects (24${\pm}$2.1yrs) participated in this study. Angular velocity of finger tapping movement was measured in both right and left index finger. As quantitative measures, root-mean-squared (RMS) angular velocity, RMS angle, peak power and total power were used. ANOVA showed that all measures were significantly different among three groups (p<0.001) in all quantitative measures. Post-hoc test revealed that all quantitative measures except peak power in patients with PD were significantly smaller than in both healthy elderly and young subjects (p<0.01). This suggests that the measures developed in this study can distinguish patients with PD from normal subjects.

• Physical Therapy Korea
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.44-49
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• 2007

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of auditory cues in the form of a metronome on gait initiation (GI) in Parkinson's disease (PD). 2 patients (mean age: 54 yrs) with idiopathic PD participated in the study. All patients (Hoehn and Yahr disability score of 2.0) were tested in the "on" state approximately 1.5 hours following the administration and fully responding to their PD medications. Subjects first initiated walking at self-initiated speeds to determine their cadences. Then, subjects were asked to initiate gait along the walkway while keeping pace with a metronome. The metronome rate (in beats/min) was set at a cadence 85% (slow condition), 100% (normal condition) and 115% (fast condition) of gait for each subject. Subjects were able to increase the speed of GI with faster cadence, but the speed of GI for the slow condition was similar to that of the normal condition. Swing toe-off was 578.3 ms for the fast condition, 709.4 ms for the normal condition and 736.2 ms for the slow condition. Respective times for swing heel-strike were 894.3 ms, 1110.2 ms and 1119.1 ms, and stance toe-off were 1105.4 ms, 1338.5 ms, and 1343.1 ms. Except for stance unloading ground reaction forces were greatest for the fast condition and smallest for the slow condition. It appears that PD patients were able to modulate GRFs and temporal events in response to auditory cues to achieve the peak acceleration force of the swing and stance limb. The findings from this study provided preliminary data, which could be used to investigate how PD patients modulate GRFs and temporal events during GI in response to tasks.

• Korean Journal of Applied Biomechanics
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.293-301
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• 2016

Objective: The purpose of this study was to analyze the effects of freezing of gait and visual information on the static postural control ability in patients with Parkinson's Disease (PD) during the bipedal stance with feet together. Method: This study included a total of 36 patients with PD; the freezer group included 17 PD patients (age: $69.3{\pm}6.2yrs$, height: $159.6{\pm}9.0cm$, weight: $63.4{\pm}9.78kg$) and the nonfreezer group included 19 PD patients (age: $71.4{\pm}5.6yrs$, height: $155.8{\pm}7.1cm$, weight: $57.7{\pm}8.6kg$). Static postural control ability was analyzed using variables of center of pressure (COP) and dividing by mediolateral, anteroposterior, and integration factors during a bipedal stance with the eyes open and closed. Results: Freezers and nonfreezers showed increases in anteroposterior velocity, mediolateral velocity, averaged velocity, and mediolateral 95% edge frequency when visual information was blocked. Additionally, freezers had greater anteroposterior range, 95% confidence ellipse area, and COP anteroposterior mean position than nonfreezers. Conclusion: Freezers and nonfreezers showed a reduction in static postural control ability when visual information was blocked. Additionally, the results of this study found a significant difference in static postural control ability between freezers and nonfreezers with PD. In particular, anteroposterior range, 95% confidence ellipse area, and COP anteroposterior mean position might be used to distinguish between freezers and nonfreezers with PD.