• Physical Therapy Korea
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.18-26
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• 2021

Previous studies have reported that deep neck flexor (DNF) exercise can improve neck problems, including neck pain, forward head posture, and headache, by targeting the deep and superficial muscles of the neck. Despite the prevailing opinion across studies, the benefits of DNF can vary according to the type of neck problems and the outcome measures adopted, ranging from positive outcomes to non-significant benefits. A meta-analysis was conducted in this study to assess conclusive evidence of the impact of DNF exercise on individuals with neck problems. We used PUBMED, MEDLINE, NDSL, EMBASE, and Web of Science to search for primary studies and the key terms used in these searches were "forward head posture (FHP)," "biofeedback," "pressure biofeedback unit," "stabilizer," "headache," and "neck pain." Twenty-four eligible studies were included in this meta-analysis and were coded according to the type of neck problems and outcome measures described, such as pain, endurance, involvement of neck muscle, craniovertebral angle (CVA), neck disability index (NDI), cervical range of motion (CROM), radiographs of the neck, posture, strength, endurance, and headache disability index. The overall effect size of the DNF exercise was 0.489. The effect sizes of the neck problems were 0.556 (neck pain), -1.278 (FHP), 0.176 (headache), and 1.850 (mix). The effect sizes of outcome measures were 1.045 (pain), 0.966 (endurance), 0.894 (deep neck flexor), 0.608 (superficial neck flexor), 0.487 (CVA), 0.409 (NDI), and 0.252 (CROM). According to the results of this study, DNF exercise can effectively reduce neck pain. Thus, DNF exercise is highly recommend as an effective exercise method for individuals suffering from neck pain.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Dental Administration
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.15-23
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• 2020

The aim of this study is to identify future-oriented tasks for Korean dental hygienists based on a literature review. A literature search is performed using 14 keywords related to tasks carried out by dental hygienists, and included articles published from 2000 to 2019 in the databases KISS, RISS, DBpia, NDSL, Papersearch, Pubmed, and Google Scholar. Six reviewers assessed the titles and abstracts of articles, and an article was selected if the study was considered to cover future-oriented tasks for Korean dental hygienists. Based on the results six local studies and two foreign studies were used for literature review and data extraction. In total, 38 tasks were classified as future-oriented tasks of dental hygienists according to the following criteria: 1) tasks that were specifically referred to as future-oriented tasks, and 2) tasks that could be classified as future-oriented tasks although no specific reference was made. Of these, the most frequently mentioned tasks were measuring periodontal pocket depth, dental hygiene assessment, providing dietary advice, infiltration anesthesia, and root planing. These were extracted from five of the eight studies, including both local and foreign studies. Dental hygiene planning, emergency, emergency management, and smoking cessation were the next most common tasks based on four studies. Even though some of these future-oriented tasks for Korean dental hygienists are included in the dentistry curriculum, and are currently performed as clinical practice for dental hygienists. Nonetheless, the reference to the legal scope is unclear. It is necessary to reconsider the scope of tasks of dental hygienists to reflect changes in domestic and foreign dental care delivery, thereby contributing to the oral health promotion of the public, where safety is guaranteed under legal protection.

• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
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• v.27 no.7
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• pp.145-152
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• 2022

Stroke results in balance disorders, these directly affect autonomy and gait ability. The aim of this meta-analysis was to determine the efficacy of proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation on balance and gait. We included all randomized controlled trials assessing the efficacy of proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation on balance and gait control in patients after stroke. This study was conducted according to the PRISMA guideline. Cochrane library, CINAHL, and PubMed were searched for studies published up to November 2021, and all randomized controlled trails(RCT) assessing PNF therapy were included. This analysis included only RCT. A total of 18 studies were selected from 1091 records obtained from the databases. The meta-analysis was performed using the R project for statistical computing version 4.0.2. The overall intervention effect was middle (standardized mean difference (SMD): 0.56) Additionally, berg balance scale (SMD: 0.48), functional reach test (SMD: 0.51), timed up and go test (SMD: 0.78), 10m walking test (SMD: 0.52), and dynamic gait index (SMD: 0.33) had medium effect sizes. The average Pedro scale was 6.63 out of 18, with a low risk of bias. These findings indicate that PNF is an effective therapy for improving balance gait in stroke patients.

• Journal of Dental Anesthesia and Pain Medicine
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.283-309
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• 2021

Achieving profound anesthesia in mandibular molars with irreversible pulpitis is a tedious task. This review aimed at evaluating the success of buccal/lingual infiltrations administered with a primary inferior alveolar nerve block (IANB) injection or as a supplemental injection after the failure of the primary injection in symptomatic and asymptomatic patients with irreversible pulpitis in human mandibular molars. The review question was "What will be the success of primary and supplemental infiltration injection in the endodontic treatment of patients with irreversible pulpitis in human mandibular molars?" We searched electronic databases, including Pubmed, Scopus, and Ebsco host and we did a comprehensive manual search. The review protocol was framed according to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) checklist. We included clinical studies that evaluated and compared the anesthetic outcomes of primary IANB with primary and/or supplementary infiltration injections. Standard evaluation of the included studies was performed and suitable data and inferences were assessed. Twenty-six studies were included, of which 13 were selected for the meta-analysis. In the forest plot representation of the studies evaluating infiltrations, the combined risk ratio (RR) was 1.88 (95% CI: 1.49, 2.37), in favor of the secondary infiltrations with a statistical heterogeneity of 77%. The forest plot analysis for studies comparing primary IANB + infiltration versus primary IANB alone showed a low heterogeneity (0%). The included studies had similar RRs and the combined RR was 1.84 (95% CI: 1.44, 2.34). These findings suggest that supplemental infiltrations given along with a primary IANB provide a better success rate. L'Abbe plots were generated to measure the statistical heterogeneity among the studies. Trial sequential analysis suggested that the number of patients included in the analysis was adequate. Based on the qualitative and quantitative analyses, we concluded that the infiltration technique, either as a primary injection or as a supplementary injection, given after the failure of primary IANB, increases the overall anesthetic efficacy.

• Therapeutic Science for Rehabilitation
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.23-36
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• 2022

Objectives : This study aimed to provide basic data on intervention strategies that occupational therapists can access by systematically analyzing the intervention and effectiveness for youth with disabilities. Methods : The RISS, PubMed, and Web of Science databases were used to search for papers published between 2006 and 2021. The keywords were "Disability AND Adolescents OR Young adult AND Transition education OR Transition program". Seven papers were selected for analysis, and the full text was reviewed. The keywords and national relations were analyzed and visualized using the WoS (Web of Science) and VOSviewer programs. Results : The participants were classified into five types (ASD or ADHD, ID, DD, and physical disability). The areas used for the intervention were mixed into three categories: occupation (academic), self-management (time), and interaction (personal relations and communication). Sociality and adaptation, quality of life, and at least one of the three categories of daily life activities showed significant improvement. Conclusions : This study can be used as basic data to expand the area where only OTs can contribute while grasping the research trend of the conversion program and presenting the direction of exchange with various experts by organizing the application and its effects.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Physical Medicine
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.93-108
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• 2022

PURPOSE: This review sought to confirm the correlation between dual-task gait and cognitive function in cognitively impaired and healthy older adults. METHOD: We used four databases (DBs), Pubmed, Cochrane library, Kmbase, and Koreamed. Searches were carried out according to the PICOS method, P (participants) were the elderly (above 65 years) with cognitive decline, I (intervention) was walking with dual tasks, C (control group) comprised the elderly without cognitive decline, O (outcome) was the correlation between gait and cognitive function and S (study) was the cross-sectional study. For the methodological quality assessment of each study, we used the Quality Assessment Tool for Observation Cohort and Cross-Sectional Studies provided by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). RESULTS: A total of 10 articles were included in this systematic review. For the components of gait, we used pace, rhythm, and variability and we observed that mild cognitive impairment mostly causes low gait performance while performing dual tasks. Among the 10 articles, 9 articles studied pace, of which 7 showed significant results. However, 2 were not significant. Also, 1 article that studied rhythm and 3 articles that studied variability showed significant results. The methodological quality of the 10 studies was fair. CONCLUSION: Gait pace was found to have a high correlation between memory, which is a cognitive ability, and overall cognitive function. It was observed that older adults with mild cognitive impairment have reduced gait pace in single-task walking, and further decrease in dual-task gait pace shows the correlation between memory and gait pace during walking.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Integrative Medicine
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.23-35
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• 2023

Purpose : Lung cancer induces a decrease in physical activity and a deterioration of respiratory ability. Exercise is an effective treatment to reduce side effects of anti-cancer treatments, also influence the survival and successful rehabilitation in lung cancer patients. However, there is insufficient evidence to show which period is the most effective to apply exercise for lung cancer patients. Therefore, this study was conducted to evaluate the efficacy of exercise-based interventions before and after surgery. Methods : Clinical trials (CTs) and randomized controlled trials (RCTs) reported in PubMed database were investigated. The trials investigated in this study were published for 10 years before August 20, 2022. The risk of bias was judged according to the Cochrane guideline. The materials included in this meta-analysis were 6-minute walk test (6MWT), pulmonary function, and quality of life (QOL). Results : 1 CT and 9 RCTs were selected in current study. In the meta-analysis, exercise increased 6MWT in preoperation (mean difference [MD] 29.49; 95 % confidence interval [CI] .99 to 57.99; p=.04; I²=0 %), 3 months postoperation (MD 54.97; 95 % CI 31.85 to 78.09; p<.001; I²=45 %) and 6 months postoperation (MD 85.59; 95 % CI 45.06 to 126.12; p<.001; I²=47 %). Exercise, also enhanced the lung function such as FEV₁/FVC (%) in postoperation (MD 7.64; 95 % CI 6.26 to 9.02; p<.001; I²=19 %). Additionally, exercise improved QOL, such as preoperative EORTC-QLQ-C30-LC13 in mental function (MD 3.21; 95 % CI .64 to 5.79; p=.01; I²=0 %) and postoperative SF-36 in mental component summary (MD 9.24; 95 % CI 4.94 to 13.54; p<.001; I²=0%). Conclusion : These results indicate that exercise-based intervention can elevate the ability to exercise and the mental componentof QOL within 3 months.

• The Journal of Internal Korean Medicine
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• v.44 no.3
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• pp.485-505
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• 2023

Objective: The purpose of this study is to assess the effectiveness and safety of using Taeksa-tang for dyslipidemia through a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCTs). Methods: The search was conducted using keywords such as "dyslipidemia", "hyperlipidemia", "taeksa tang", "zexie tang", and "takusha to" in 12 databases (Pubmed, Cochrane, Embase, ScienceDirect, CNKI, Wanfang, CiNii, RISS, KISS, ScienceON, OASIS, and DBpia) on April 13, 2023. There were no limits on the publication period and language. Cochrane's risk of bias (RoB) was used to evaluate the quality of the studies. A meta-analysis was conducted according to the outcome measurements such as total effective rate (TER), total cholesterol (TC), triglyceride (TG), HDL-cholesterol (HDL-C), LDL-cholesterol (LDL-C), and adverse effects, using the Review Manager web. Results: A total of 9 RCTs were selected. In evaluating the RoB, 2 studies mentioning the random sequence generation, 1 study conducting double blindness, and 8 studies without missing values were evaluated as low risk, while 1 study without mentioning the random sequence generation was evaluated as high risk. All other parts were evaluated as unclear risk. The treatment group (Taeksa-tang or Taeksa-tang-gagam) showed more statistically significant effects compared to the control group (Western medicine or Chinese patent medicine) in TER (RR : 1.24, 95% CI 1.15 to 1.34, P<0.00001), TC (MD : -1.12, 95% CI -1.68 to -0.56, P<0.0001), TG (MD : -1.08, 95% CI -1.65 to -0.51, P=0.0002), HDL-C (MD : 0.63, 95% CI 0.34 to 0.93, P<0.0001), LDL-C (MD : -0.81, 95% CI -1.10 to -0.53, P<0.00001). In addition, the treatment group showed lower adverse effects compared to the control group (RR : 0.30, 95% CI 0.12 to 0.74, P=0.008). Conclusion: This study suggests that Taeksa-tang is effective and safe to use for treating dyslipidemia. However, due to the low quality of the included studies, more clinical studies need to be conducted in the future to increase the possibility of clinical use.

• The Journal of Korean Obstetrics and Gynecology
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.96-120
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• 2023

Objectives: This study reports the findings that support the efficacy of herbal medicine (HM) for premenstrual syndrome (PMS). Methods: We conducted meta-analysis of findings from randomized controlled trials (RCTs) for PMS treated with HM. The articles were published before July 2022, located using 9 databases (Pubmed, EMBASE, Cochrane Library, CINAHL, CNKI, CiNii, SCIENCE ON, KoreaMed, OASIS). Results: We observed 2,034 studies, of which 23 RCTs met our inclusion criteria. The risk of bias in the included studies was relatively unclear or high. Meta-analysis of 3 RCTs showed that HM group had a significantly higher total effective rate than the western medicine group (RR 1.20 [95% CI 1.06, 1.36, p=0.004]). Meta-analysis of 1 RCT showed that HM group had a significantly lower symptom score (MD -3.04 [95% CI -5.36, -0.72, p=0.01]), while there was no significant difference in daily record of severity of problems scale (MD -20.52 [95% CI -49.33, 8.29, p=0.16]). Conclusions: HM significantly improved PMS symptoms than general treatment and no serious adverse events were reported. However, the evidence on the effectiveness and safety of HM for PMS was not enough to provide reliable results due to the small number and low quality of included studies. We believe that rigorous RCTs will lead to more reliable evidence of the intervention.

• Journal of Physiology & Pathology in Korean Medicine
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.1-9
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• 2024

Cognitive reserve (CR) is a concept that can explain the discrepancies between the pathologic burden of the disease and clinical manifestations. It refers to the individual susceptibility to age-related brain changes and pathologies related to Alzheimer's disease, thus recognized as a factor affecting the trajectories of the disease. The purpose of this study was to explore the current states of clinical studies on neural substrates of CR in Alzheimer's disease using functional magnetic resonance imaging. We searched for clinical studies on CR using fMRI in the Pubmed, Cochrane library, RISS, KISS and ScienceON on August 14, 2023. Once the online search was finished, studies were selected manually by the inclusion criteria. Finally, we analyzed the characteristics of selected articles and reviewed the neural substrates of CR. Total thirty-four studies were included in this study. As surrogate markers of CR, not only education and occupational complexity, but also composite score and questionnaire-based method, which cover various areas of life, were mainly used. The most utilized methods in resting-state fMRI were independent component analysis, seed-based analysis, and graph theory analysis. Through the analysis, we demonstrated that neuroimaging techniques could capture the neural substrates associated with cognitive reserve. Moreover, functional connectivity of brain regions centered on prefrontal and parietal cortex and network areas such as default mode network showed a significant correlation with CR, which indicated a significant association with cognitive performance. CR may induce differential effects according to the disease status. We hope that this perspective on cognitive reserve would be helpful when conducting clinical researches on the mechanisms of traditional Korean medicine for Alzheimer's disease in the future.