• Journal of Korean society of Dental Hygiene
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.85-99
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• 2009

The purpose of this study was to examine the awareness of dental hygienists about on-the-job training in public health sector in an effort to stir up their on-the-job training(OJT) and to facilitate the planning of successful educational programs. A survey was conducted nationwide for two months in October and November 2006, and the answer sheets from 811 dental hygienists were analyzed. The findings of the study were as follows: 1. 40.7 percent of the dental hygienists investigated never underwent OJT geared toward public officials, which wasn't linked to oral health. 2. As for the experiences of professional oral health education(or OJT) as members of local public dental clinics by service term, 64.9 percent of the dental hygienists who had worked for less than 10 years never received that kind of education, and 70.5 percent of those with a 15-year or more career received that education just once(p<0.05). The dental hygienists who received that education viewed it favorably, as they found that to be conducive to their job performance. In the event of those who didn't receive that education, a lack of chance to do that was the most common reason. 3. In regard to motivation of receiving professional oral health education(or OJT), the largest rate of the dental hygienists who stood at 71.9 percent received that education voluntarily in pursuit of self-development and better job performance. The training programs provided by the oral health division of the Ministry for Health, Welfare and Family Affairs were excluded in this study. As to educational spending by the dental hygienists or their employers over the past two years, 56.9 percent paid 100 thousand to less than 500 thousand won. 46.6 percent never paid for that, and about 15.5 percent received education at their own expenses. Concerning the form of OJT, lectures were provided to 50.3 percent. 4. The dental hygienists who worked in local public health clinics hoped for more intensive and better education and training related to oral health projects.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.339-346
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• 2018

Background: Workplace bulling is a pervasive phenomenon with negative consequences for the health of victims and the productivity of organizations. The aim of this study was to measure the prevalence and forms of workplace bullying among employees working at the public health-care sector of Cyprus using the Greek version of Leymann Inventory of Psychological Terror (LIPT) instrument. Methods: A translation process was followed from the French to the Greek version of LIPT questionnaire. Test-retest reliability expressed by Pearson's correlation coefficient was 0.98 indicating excellent reproducibility. Internal consistency reliability assessed by Cronbach ${\alpha}$ coefficient was 0.87 suggesting high reliability. LIPT instrument was distributed among 403 employees working at the primary health-care setting and at the largest public hospital of Cyprus with response rate of 73.4%. Results: Women comprised the majority of participants (71.4%). Mean age was 43.3 years. Prevalence of workplace bulling according to Leymann's definition was 5.9%. Most common forms of bullying were "Being continuously interrupted" (17.2%) and "continuously being given new work assignments" (13.5%). Women were significantly more often exposed to at least one mobbing behavior than men within the previous year (49% vs. 35.7%, p = 0.038), whereas nurses were significantly exposed to at least one mobbing behavior as compared to physicians (53.3% vs. 31.4%, p = 0.004). Conclusion: This was the first study that examined the prevalence of workplace bullying in the public health-care sector by elaborating the Greek version of LIPT instrument. Results showed that workplace bullying is a common and complex phenomenon among health-care organizations.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.457-492
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• 2011

The primary goal of our study was to investigate the vast transformations of the healthcare sector in Korea during the past half century. Official data reported in the Korean statistical yearbooks and secondary data suggested by previous studies were used for institutional analysis of healthcare environment. Information on hospital released by the Korean Hospital Association was also used for ecological analysis. Institutional analysis: We identified three distinctive eras based primarily on changes in institutional logics, institutional actors, and governance structures : 'professional dominance (1952-1976)', 'government involvement (1977-1999)', and 'coexistence of competing institutional logics (2000-present)'. During the first era, physician association supported by Korean government comprised the primary governance regime. During the second era, the government became a major actor as a regulator and purchaser in health care sector, introducing of the 'mandatory national health insurance'. During the third era, making healthcare system sustainable and providing health care efficiently was overarching goals although it was hard to find a single central logic dominating this period. Ecological analysis: Evidence from the analysis of hospital population suggested that the expansion of the bed capacity was made from different processes, shifting from the ecological process in 1980s to the adaptive process in 1990s. And Korean hospitals had changed following both 'directional process' and 'stabilizing process' over time. Based on our results, we concluded that more studies to compare more organizational populations other than hospitals and to empirically test the effects of institutional changes on organizational changes and vice-versa, need to be conducted.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.26 no.1
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• pp.79-91
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• 2016

'Health in All Policies' is a new strategy for governance for health in 21st century. The evolution of health promotion has affected the creation of the strategy through the efforts to tackle health inequalities by addressing social determinants of health. More concern about health inequalities, involving wider policy areas, and higher level of institutionalization distinguish the strategy from the old intersectoral collaboration such as intersectoral action for health and healthy public policy. Making intersectoral collaboration the mainstream of policy making is important to address integrated policy agendas such as 'Health in All Policies' and 'Sustainable Development Goals.' Political leadership and interpersonal skills are also required to strengthen the capacity of public health sector for implementing 'Health in All Policies' in local, national, and international circumstances.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.53 no.6
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• pp.455-464
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• 2020

Objectives: The distribution of hospitals in Korea is unbalanced in terms of accessibility. Many local public health centers (PHCs) exempt out-of-pocket payments (OOPs) based on local government laws to increase coverage. However, this varies across administrative regions, as many make this exemption for the elderly, while others do not. This study aimed to evaluate the effects of the OOP exemption at local PHCs among elderly individuals. Methods: This study used online data on Korean national law to gather information on individual local governments' regulations regarding OOP exemptions. Individual-level data were gathered from the 2018 Community Health Survey and regional-level data from public online sources. Results: The study analyzed 132 regions and 44 918 elderly people. A statistical analysis of rate differences and 2-level multiple logistic regression were carried out. The rate difference according to whether elderly individuals resided in areas with the OOP exemption was 1.97%p (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.07 to 2.88) for PHC utilization, 1.37%p (95% CI, 0.67 to 2.08) for hypertension treatment, and 2.19%p (95% CI, 0.63 to 3.74) for diabetes treatment. The regression analysis showed that OOP exemption had an effect on hypertension treatment, with a fixed-effect odds ratio of 1.25 (95% CI, 1.05 to 1.48). Conclusions: The OOP exemption at PHCs can affect medical utilization in Korea, especially for hypertension treatment. The OOP exemption should be expanded to improve healthcare utilization in Korea.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.97-102
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• 2017

On May 10, 2017, Moon Jae-in's Government launched. The election pledges of Moon's Government in healthcare sector were extracted from those of president election camp and Democratic Party. The main pledges were enhancing the coverage of healthcare costs, management of healthcare costs for elderly, restructuring the health insurance contribution system, and improving the public nature of healthcare system. There are many policy tasks to realize the electoral pledge, especially, financial task is main. The National Planning and Advisory Committee are setting the policy priorities and making the detailed plans. Although this paper deals the initial evaluation of main election pledges, the precise evaluation is needed for the final plan of healthcare policy.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.243-249
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• 2023

Background: Southeast Asia has many people who work in the agriculture sector. Not many stakeholders pay special attention to the health of farmers, even though they are exposed to various types of hazards. One of the most common health complaints among farmers is related to work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WMSDs). This study aims to assess the prevalence of WMSDs and factors associated with them among farmers in Southeast Asia. Methods: A literature search on PubMed, ScienceDirect, Scopus, and EBSCO was conducted. Articles were included if they studied ergonomic problems among farmers from 11 countries in the Southeast Asia region and were published during 2015-2022. The Critical Appraisal Skills Program was used to evaluate the quality of the articles. The search process and retrieval process reflected PRISMA's recommendation. Result: There were 14 studies found from 3 countries that had published articles in PubMed and ScienceDirect, including Thailand [8], Indonesia [4], and Malaysia [2]. The prevalence of WMSDs in Thailand, Indonesia, and Malaysia was 78,31%, 81,27%, and 88,39%, respectively. Common factors associated with WMSDs include age, sex, smoking habits, drinking alcohol habits, working period (years), type of work, awkward position, non-ergonomic equipment, repetitive movements, and lifting heavy loads. Conclusion: The prevalence of WMSDs among farmers in Southeast Asia is considerably high. Effective intervention is essential for reducing the prevalence and protecting workers' health and well-being.

• The Journal of Korean Medicine
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• v.35 no.1
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• pp.145-156
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• 2014

Objectives: Korean medicine hospitals, since they first emerged in the early 1970s, have rapidly become a new member of the hospital population. As it was a new organizational frame for traditional medicine, we tried to analyze the changes of Korean medicine hospitals coping with institutional environment and their relative positioning in the whole health care sector. Methods: On the basis of Scott and his colleagues' identification of the three components of institutional environments, changes in organizational logics, actors, and governance of Korean medicine hospitals during the period from 1971 to 2010 were analyzed. Results: First, Similar to previous literature on institutional eras of Korean health sector, three distinct periods were characterized: the foundation of Korean medicine hospitals to consolidate the legal status(1971~1986), a rapid increase of entrepreneurial hospitals through cultural-cognitive legitimacy(1987~2001), and the reinforcement of specialization and competition(2002~present). Conclusions: Results suggested that: (1) changes in institutional environments hada heavy impact on structural and behavioral changes among Korean medicine hospitals, but the pace was slower than that of western medicine hospitals. (2) In structure, Korean medicine hospitals have positioned themselves as unofficial long-term care hospitals, focusing on chronic diseases(e.g. cerebrovascular disease). Our study demonstrated that organizational theories can provide useful framework for the analysis of Korean medicine and related policies. Indeed, one of the most important implications of this study is that understanding changes in institutional environments is important to understand the process of how members of the health care sector live, grow, change, decline and survive.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.4-12
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• 2014

Background: The purpose of this study is to investigate current status and investigation of government agencies, communities, corporates, hospitals, non-governmental organization, non-profit organization, and so on which performed Corporate Social Responsibility to global health issues. Methods: This paper focuses on analyzing definition and principle of public-private partnership (PPP), types of PPP, challenge of PPP through delphi survey and interview which need to be discussed by professional groups such as private groups, universities and researches, government decision makers, corporates, and hospitals for successful PPP. Results: Based on this analysis on global health issues of 237 groups, the results were shown that main global health issues of many hospitals were aids of the developing countries (48%). Main program was activities of overseas volunteers (30%) and most 152 groups (42%) supported Asia. Also, this paper gives a definition of PPP that is the growth together in PPPs as a way of fulfilling public tasks in partnership between the state administration and private enterprises to apply both strengths behind transparency, accountability. Conclusion: In conclusion, from the results of analysis, we suggest as prior setting of global issues for both demand and supply side and are served as the effective way by PPP on global health issues. Moreover, this study will be expanded on the sections of findings, multiple researches, discussion, and policy recommendations.

• Journal of Society of Preventive Korean Medicine
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.17-41
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• 2005

Current Korean medical system is evaluated as inefficient and the government is planning a new medical development plan to provide guaranteed life-long medical service and more efficient medical system Korean medicine also needs to participate as the primary medical provider and strengthen public recognition. The needs for active participation are essential to prevent irrational medical policies and Korean medicine can exercise medical merits. When the doctors of Korean medicine are recognized as the primary medical provider, not only social rights are served but also provide medical service to less privileged sector of the society. This calls for the establishment of system for attending physician and public health doctor from Korean medicine. Another important issue is the establishment of public medical service at the government level. Doctors of Korean medicine should be posted at the national health center and other public hospitals. Revision of the current policies on Korean medicine must be made to yield concrete outcome of the public Korean medicine service as well as cooperation between the conventional allopathic medical community and the Korean medical community