• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.309-314
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• 2014

Purpose: Cigarette smoking causes many kinds of cancer, and it is more closely related with lung cancer, rather than other cancers. Smoking is the leading cause of lung cancer and ninety percent of the smokers are male in China, but there is little published data concerning the psychological responses in the male smokers with lung cancer and its influence on the symptom burden. The aim of the study was to verify the hypothesis that male smokers with lung cancer have more positive attitude and less symptom burden, comparing to male non-smokers. Methods: A total of 194 men with cancer in West China Hospital, Sichuan, China, were assessed by self-administered questionnaire. Psychological response was measured by the Chinese version of Mini-Mental Adjustment to Cancer scale (Mini-MAC), and symptom burden was measured by the physical symptom distress scale from the Rotterdam Symptom Checklist (RSCL). Results: We found that smokers with lung cancer got higher scores in positive attitude and a smaller symptom burden than non-smokers. Patients with education lower than high school got higher scores of positive attitude compared to college graduate patients (p=0.038). Smokers with lung cancer who knew the potential carcinogenicity of cigarette showed less negative emotions (p=0.011). The psychological response was not affected by age, clinical stage, cell type, smoking duration and amount. Conclusions: Male smokers with lung cancer have a more positive attitude and fewer symptoms, comparing to male non-smokers. Appropriate psychological intervention for non-smokers with lung cancer deserves more attention.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.41 no.2
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• pp.80-85
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• 2014

Objective: To investigate: the prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in Korean women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), and the relationship between vitamin D status and clinical or metabolic features in this group. Methods: We recruited 38 women with PCOS using the Rotterdam criteria. A total of 109 premenopausal control women were matched with patients based on age and body mass index. Serum 25-hydroxy vitamin D concentrations less than 20 ng/mL were classified as frank vitamin D deficiency. Since vitamin D may play a significant role in metabolic disturbances in women with PCOS, correlations between clinical or metabolic parameters and vitamin D status were analyzed separately in patients and controls. Results: Women with PCOS showed no differences in the level of 25-hydroxy vitamin D ($19.6{\pm}6.6ng/mL$ in patients vs. $20.1{\pm}7.4ng/mL$ in controls, respectively, p=0.696) or prevalence of vitamin D deficiency (57.9% in patients vs. 56.5% in controls, respectively, p=0.880). In addition, we did not find any correlations between serum vitamin D level and clinical or metabolic profiles in either PCOS patients or controls. Conclusion: Our study found no differences in the absolute level of serum vitamin D between PCOS patients and matched controls. Prevalence of vitamin D deficiency was equally common among both patients and controls. Additionally, we did not find any correlations between serum vitamin D level and clinical or metabolic profiles, suggesting that the role of vitamin D in the pathogenesis of PCOS is not yet clear.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.71-80
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• 2009

Objective: PCOS is one of the most common endocrine disorder affecting reproductive age women. It shows wide range of reproductive and metabolic manifestations. This study was to determine the differences of clinical and laboratory characteristics between adolescent and adult Korean Daegu Kyungpook PCOS patients. We also compared clinical and laboratory values of Korean PCOS patients to Turkish and American PCOS patients. Methods: 88 cases were diagnosed and enrolled as PCOS patients, based on 2003 Rotterdam criteria, who visited KNUH Reproductive Endocrinology division between Jan. 2000 and Apr. 2008. We retrospectively reviewed clinical characteristics, serum hormone levels, ultrasono-graphic findings. And we divided into 2 groups, adolescent and adult. We analyzed them with Chi-square test and Student's t-test statistically. Results: There were no statistically significant differences between adult and adolescent Korean PCOS patients. The prevalence of hyperandrogenism such as facial acne or hirsutism, obesity, and insulin resistance of Korean PCOS women was significantly lower than Turkish and American PCOS women. Conclusion: From the results of this study, we can suggest that it is sure that there are differences of clinical and laboratory characteristics of PCOS patients between races. Genetic background, dietary habits and life style affect the expression of clinical symptoms of PCOS. But we could not find out the difference between adolescent and adult PCOS patients of same race. It might be due to the limitation of small patient number and narrow range of age distribution. So, there must be large scale and multi-center and multi-regional study.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.97-104
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• 2006

Objective: To investigate whether polymorphism of Catechol-O-methyltransferase(COMT) gene is associated with the risk of polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) in Korean women. Methods: One hundred and thirty-six PCOS patients and eighty four controls were enrolled. Blood samples were collected from the patients diagnosed according to the 2003 revised criteria of the Rotterdam ESHRE/ASRM-sponsored PCOS consensus workshop group. Age matched women with regular menstruation from same geographic region were recruited as control subject. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) of PCR products were done to determine all individuals' genotype. Results: In women with $COMT^{LL}$ genotype, there was decreased PCOS risk and this difference was statistically significant (OR 0.24, 95% CI 0.11~0.51). Conclusion: The results suggest that the $COMT^{LL}$ genetic polymorphism might be associated with PCOS risk in Korean women.

• Proceedings of the Korea Society for Industrial Systems Conference
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• 2006.05a
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• pp.95-108
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• 2006

Because of rapid expansion of third party logistics, fierce competition in the transportation industry, and the diversification and globalization of transportation channels, an effective transportation planning by means of multimodal transport is badly needed. Accordingly, this study aims to suggest an optimal transport algorithm for the multimodal transport in the international logistics. Cargoes and stopovers can be changed numerously according to the change of transportation modes, thus being a NP-hard problem. As a solution for this problem, first of all, we have applied a pruning algorithm to simplify it, suggesting a heuristic algorithm for constrained shortest path problem to find out a feasible area with an effective time range and effective cost range, which has been applied to the Label Setting Algorithm, consequently leading to multiple Pareto optimal solutions. Also, in order to test the efficiency of the algorithm for constrained shortest path problem, this paper has applied it to the actual transportation path from Busan port of Korea to Rotterdam port of Netherlands.

• Journal of Ship and Ocean Technology
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.1-13
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• 2001

Present-day rules and regulations for the design and construction of ships are almost without exemption of a prescriptive and deterministic nature. Often it is argued that this situation is far from ideal; it does no right to the advances, which have been made during the past decades in engineering tools in marine technology, both in methodology and in computational power. Within IMO this has been realized for some time and has resulted in proposals to use Formal Safety Assessment(FSA) as a tool to improve and to modernize the rule making process. The present paper makes use of elements of the FSA methodology, but instead of working towards generic regulations or requirements, a Risk Assessment Approach, not unlike a 'safety case'; valid for a certain ship or type of ship is worked out. Delft University of Technology investigated the application of safely assessment procedures in ship design, in co-operation with Anthony Veder Shipowners and safety experts from Safely Service Center BV. The ship considered is a semi-pressurized-fully refrigerated LPG carrier. On the basis of the assumption that a major accident occurs, various accident, scenarios were considered and assessed, which would impair the safety of the carrier. In a so-called Risk Matrix, in which accident frequencies versus the consequence of the scenarios are depicted, the calculated risks all appeared lo be in the ALARP('as low as reasonable practicable') region. A number of design alternatives were compared, both on safety merits and cost-effectiveness. The experience gained with this scenario-based approach will be used to establish a set of general requirements for safety assessment techniques in ship design. In the view that assessment results will be most probably presented in a quasi-quantified manner, the requirements are concerned with uniformity of both the safety assessment. These requirements make it possible that valid comparison between various assessment studies can be made. Safety assessment, founded on these requirements, provides a validated and helpful source of data during the coming years, and provides naval architects and engineers with tools experience and data for safety assessment procedures in ship design. However a lot of effort has to be spent in order to make the methods applicable in day-to-day practice.

• Journal of Korean Port Research
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.17-29
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• 1996

It is required to consider pricing and non-pricing factors and external economy in order to achieve the objects of physical distribution system in a port. Recently, among the three factors, much attention has been paid to non-pricing factor in the system. Although physical distribution service in a port(PDSP)has been frequently mentioned in documents and literature related to port and shipping studies, few study on it has not been systematically and scientifically made due to the following problems; $\circ$ there are not proper criteria to evaluate level and quality of PDSP and as a result it is difficult to set up a unified standard for doing so. $\circ$ algorithms to evaluate problems with complex and ambiguous attributes and multiple levels in PDSP are not available. This thesis aims to establish a paradigm to evaluate PDSP and to abvance existing decision making methods to deal with complex and ambiguous problems in PDSP. To tackle the first purpose, extensive and thorough literature survey was carried out on general physical distribution service, which is a corner stone to handle PDSp. In addition, through interviews and questionnaire to the expert, it have extracted 82 factors of physical distribution service in a port. They have been classified into 6 groups by KJ method and each group defined by the expert's advice as follows; a. Potentiality b. Exactness c. safety d. Speediness e. Convenience f. Linkage Prior to the service evaluation, many kinds of its attributes must be identified on the basis of rational decision owing to complexity and ambiguity inherent in PDSP. An analytical hierarchy process (AHP) is a method to evaluate them but it is not applicable to PDSP that have property of non-additivity and overlapped attributes. Therefore, probablility measure can not be used to evaluate PDSP but fuzzy measure is required. Hierarchical fuzzy integral method, which is merged AHP with fuzzy measure, is also not effective method to evaluate attributes because it has vary complicated way to calculate fuzzy measure identification coefficient of attributes. A new evaluation algorithm has been introduced to solve problems with multi-attribute and multi-level hierarchy, which is called hierarchy fuzzy process(HFP).Analysis on ambiguous aspects of PDSP under study which is not easy to be defined is prerequisite to evaluate it. HFP is different from algorithm existed in that it clarified the relationship between fuzzy measure and probability measure adopted in AHP and that it directly calculates the family of fuzzy measure from overlapping coefficient and probability measure to treat and evaluate ambiguous and complex aspects of PDSP. A new evaluation algorithm HFP was applied to evaluate level of physical distribution service in the biggest twenty container port in the world. The ranks of the ports are as follows; 1. Rotterdam Port, 2. Hamburg Port, 3. Singapore Port, 4. Seattle Port, 5. Yokohama Port, 6. Long beach Port, 7. Oakland Port, 8. Tokyo Port, 9. Hongkong Port, 10. Kobe Port, 11. Los Angeles Port, 12. New york Port, 13. Antwerp Port, 14. Felixstowe Port, 15. Bremerhaven Port, 16. Le'Havre Port, 17. Kaoshung Port, 18. Killung Port, 19. Bangkok Port, 20. Pusan Port

• Gut and Liver
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• v.12 no.6
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• pp.714-721
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• 2018

Background/Aims: Recently reported prognostic models for primary biliary cholangitis (PBC) have been shown to be effective in Western populations but have not been well-validated in Asian patients. This study aimed to compare the performance of prognostic models in Korean patients and to investigate whether inflammation-based scores can further help in prognosis prediction. Methods: This study included 271 consecutive patients diagnosed with PBC in Korea. The following prognostic models were evaluated: the Barcelona model, the Paris-I/II model, the Rotterdam criteria, the GLOBE score and the UK-PBC score. The neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) was analyzed with reference to its association with prognosis. Results: For predicting liver transplant or death at the 5-year and 10-year follow-up examinations, the UK-PBC score (areas under the receiver operating characteristic curve [AUCs], 0.88 and 0.82) and GLOBE score (AUCs, 0.85 and 0.83) were significantly more accurate in predicting prognosis than the other scoring systems (all p<0.05). There was no significant difference between the performance of the UK-PBC and GLOBE scores. In addition to the prognostic models, a high NLR (>2.46) at baseline was an independent predictor of reduced transplant-free survival in the multivariate analysis (adjusted hazard ratio, 3.74; p<0.01). When the NLR was applied to the prognostic models, it significantly differentiated the prognosis of patients. Conclusions: The UK-PBC and GLOBE scores showed good prognostic performance in Korean patients with PBC. In addition, a high NLR was associated with a poorer prognosis. Including the NLR in prognostic models may further help to stratify patients with PBC.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.155-164
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• 2005

Objective: This study was performed to investigate the effects of pioglitazone, an insulin sensitizing agent, on insulin resistance, ovarian function and intraovarian stromal blood flow in patients with polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS). Material and Methods: Thirty patients with PCOS, aged 18~34 years, were recruited. Criteria for diagnosis of PCOS were as defined in 2003 Rotterdam consensus. They were treated for 6 months with pioglitazone at a dose of 30 mg/day orally. The hormonal blood profile, fasting serum glucose levels, a glycemic response to 75 g oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT), and an ovarian stromal artery (OSA) blood flow were assessed at baseline and after 6 months of treatment. Results: Eighteen (60.0%) of 30 patients treated with pioglitazone demonstrated a spontaneous ovulation After pioglitazone treatment, fasting insulin concentrations, serum glucose levels after 75 g OGTT significantly decreased (p=0.001, p=0.04, respectively), and fasting glucose to insulin (G/I) ratio significantly increased (p<0.001). The pioglitazone treatment induced a significant reduction in serum LH, testosterone (T) and free T levels (p<0.001, p=0.02, p=0.002, respectively). The resistance index (RI) values of OSA significantly increased after treatment (p<0.001). In analyzing pioglitazone-treated patients according to their body mass index (BMI), nonobese group as well as obese group showed a significant improvement in fasting G/I ratio (p<0.01). The pioglitazone treatment induced a significant reduction in serum LH and free T levels in nonobese group (p<0.001, p<0.05, respectively) as well as obese group (p=0.001, p<0.05, respectively). The RI values of OSA significantly increased in both nonobese and obese groups after pioglitazone treatment (p<0.001, p=0.003, respectively). Conclusions: Pioglitazone could ameliorate the glycoinsulinemic metabolism, and this beneficial effects of this drug could improve the endocrine-reproductive condition associated with the decrease of ovarian stromal artery blood flow, in both nonobese and obese patients with PCOS.

• The Journal of Korean Obstetrics and Gynecology
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.175-191
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• 2021

Objectives: This study aims to analyze the medical record of eight cases of polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) in a local Korean medicine clinic, in order to provide evidence on Korean medicine treatment of PCOS and to suggest the direction of future studies. Methods: The medical records of eight cases diagnosed with PCOS based on 2003 Rotterdam Criteria and whose total testosterone level was 0.53 ng/ml and over were retrospectively analyzed. The primary outcome was total testosterone level, and the secondary outcomes included luteinizing hormone (LH) and follicle stimulating hormone (FSH) levels, LH/FSH ratio, weight, last mentrual period (LMP), numerical rating scale (NRS) score of dysmenorrhea, and other associated symptoms pre- and post-treatment. Korean medicine treatment consists of the complex herbal prescription consisting of Yukmijihwang-tang, Baekho-tang, Daesiho-tang, and Gyejibokryeong-hwan, modified according to symptoms; acupuncture and electroacupuncture on 中脘 (CV12), 下脘 (CV10), 關元 (CV4), 石門 (CV5), 合谷 (LI4), 太衝 (LR3), 三陰交 (SP6), and 懸鍾 (GB39); and indirect moxibustion on 神闕 (CV8). Results: The average total testosterone level lowered statistically significantly after the treatment. The average FSH and LH levels lowered with insignificance, while the average LH/FSH ratio and weight lowered statistically significantly. During the treatment period of three to six months, every patient had the menstrual cycle shortened except for one case; and two cases with infertility problem succeeded in being pregnant. There was no adverse event. Conclusions: The Korean medicine treatment was found effective in treating PCOS, especially regarding hyperandrogenism, amenorrhea or oligomenorrhea, and infertility.