• Journal of Applied Biological Chemistry
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• v.64 no.3
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• pp.245-251
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• 2021

Codonopsis lanceolata (Deoduk) was grown in East Asia, including Korea, China, Japan, and Russia, and the roots of C. lanceolata have been used as functional foods and traditional medicine to treat symptoms of cough, bronchitis, asthma, tuberculosis, and dyspepsia. The phytochemicals of C. lanceolata have been reported such as phenylpropanoids, polyacetylenes, saponins, and flavonoids that are involved in pharmacological effects such as anti-obesity, anti-inflammation, anti-tumor, anti-oxidant, and anti-microbial activities. Selecting marker substances of the main producing area by MS-based metabolomics analysis is important to ensure the beneficial effect of C. lanceolata without side-effects because differences in cultivated areas of plants were related not only to the safety of medicinal plants but also to changes in chemical composition and biological efficacy. In our present study, ultra-performance liquid chromatography quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry combined with multivariate statistical analysis was applied to recognize the main producing area of C. lanceolata in South Korea. As a result of Principal Component Analysis and loading plot analysis of three groups, Inje (Kangwon-do), Hoengseong (Kangwon-do), and Muju (Jeonlabuk-do), several secondary metabolites of C. lanceolata including tangshenoside I, lancemaside A, and lancemaside G, were suggested as potential marker substances to distinguish the place of main producing area of C. lanceolata.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.31 no.10
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• pp.922-928
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• 2021

To profile the microbial compositions of Korean traditional fermented paste made from whole soybeans, Doenjang and Cheonggukjang, and compare their taxonomic differences, we analyzed the V3-V4 region of 16S rRNA of naturally fermented foods by using next generation sequencing. α-Diversity results showed that values indicating bacterial community abundances (OTUs) and richness (ACE, Chao1) were statistically significant (p=0.0001) in Doenjang and Cheonggukjang. Firmicutes was the most common phylum in both groups, representing 97.02% and 99.67% in the Doenjang and Cheonggukjang groups, respectively. Bacillus was the most dominant genus, accounting for 71.70% and 59.87% in both groups. Linear discriminant (LDA) effect size (LEfSe) analysis was performed to reveal the significant ranking of abundant taxa in different fermented foods. A size-effect threshold of 2.0 on the logarithmic LDA score was used for discriminative functional biomarkers. On the species level, Bacillus subtilis, Tetragenococcus halophilus, and Clostridium arbusti were significantly more abundant in Doenjang than in Cheonggukjang, whereas Bacillus thermoamylovorans, Enterococcus faecium, and Lactobacillus sakei were significantly more abundant in Cheonggukjang than in Doenjang. Permutational multivariate analysis of variance (PERMANOVA) showed that the statistical difference in microbial clusters between the two groups was significant at the confidence level of p=0.001. This research could be used as basic research to identify the correlation between the biochemical characteristics of Korean fermented foods and the distribution of microbial communities.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.31 no.7
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• pp.631-640
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• 2021

Houttuynia cordata Thunberg has been studied for a variety of pharmacological actions in traditional oriental medicine. In this study, we investigated the effects of Houttuynia cordata ethanol extract (HCE) on benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) models induced by castration and testosterone propionate (TP) injection. Thirty rats were divided into six groups. One group was used as a normal control, and the other groups were castrated and had intraperitoneal injections of TP for 14 days to induce BPH. A positive control group was given daily doses of finasteride (5 mg/kg) to the BPH model. Rats administered HCE (0.5, 1 or 2 mg/kg) instead of finasteride were compared with controls as experimental groups. There was no statistical significance in terms of prostate weight based on 100 g of body weight. The concentrations of 5-α reductase and dehydroxytestosteronre (DHT) were determined via ELISA tests, and there was a significant decrease in all experimental groups. The 0.5 mg/kg HCE group had the lowest level of 5-α reductase, and the 2 mg/kg HCE group had the lowest level of DHT. In the histopathological observation of prostates, the control and the 2 mg/kg HCE groups had normal cell shapes and no swelling. However, in the negative control group and the 1 mg/kg HCE group, the cells were swollen, and the gap between the cells was narrowed. In particular, in the 0.5 mg/kg HCE group, some cells were bursting. Therefore, the administration of more than 2 mg/kg of HCE is suitable to protect against BPH.

• Journal of Acupuncture Research
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.12-20
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• 2019

Background: This study was conducted to verify the effectiveness and effectiveness-related factors of Korean medicine (KM) treatment for patients who have been involved in traffic accidents (TA). Methods: The medical records of 150 TA patients hospitalized in Dongguk University Bundang Oriental Medicine Hospital from September 2017 to May 2018 were reviewed. Medical records included information on patient demographic characteristics, TA situations, use of KM treatment, clinical characteristics, 4 scales [numeric rating scale (NRS), visual analogue scale (VAS), EuroQol-visual analogue scale (EQ-VAS) and neck disability index (NDI)]. Statistical analyses were performed to determine the effectiveness and effectiveness-related factors of treatment. Results: The 150 patients (almost 1:1 gender ratio) were typically in their 40's (26.67%), had rear impact to their vehicle (37.33%), were in the driver's seat (70.00%), and without head trauma and loss of consciousness (83.33%). The main symptoms were neck pain (60.66%) and lower back pain (54.00%). All 150 patients showed significant improvement after KM treatment. 4 scales significantly improved when the treatment started within 3 days from the accident and patients were hospitalized longer and took more diverse treatments. The patients experiencing a higher initial pain level (NRS 8-10, $VAS{\geq}70$) showed significant improvement of NRS and VAS scores with faster and longer inpatient treatments than the other patients. The patients with higher initial pain levels ($VAS{\geq}70$) also showed significant improvement in EQ-VAS scores. Conclusion: KM treatment was effective for TA patients in this study. Treatment initiation time, hospitalization period, treatment diversity and initial pain level are related to the degree of improvement of a patient's symptoms.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.20 no.8
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• pp.264-270
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• 2019

The purpose of this study is to examine the change of study crafting and nursing recognition after applying a documentary form of education to nursing students, and also to confirm the nursing students' satisfaction with the documentary style of education. The subjects of the study were 84 nursing students in their first year in the B area. The data collection period ran from March 11, 2019 to April 15, 2019. The collected data was analyzed using frequencies, percentages, means, standard deviations and paired t-test by employing the SPSS WIN 24.0 computer program. The program consisted of four parts and was operated for 3 hours and 30 minutes, and three domestic documentaries were applied. The study crafting of nursing students increased after the education but there was no statistical significance for this. The nursing recognition was significant (t=-4.49, p<.001) In detail, traditional image, social image and nursing prospect were significant (t=-2.13, p=.036; t=-5.09, p<.001; t=-4.17, p=<.001). Satisfaction with the use of documentaries averaged 4.54 points, as detailed items, the satisfaction with the learning method was 4.54, the satisfaction with the contents of the education was 4.62 points, the benefit was 4.56, the interest was 4.44 and the interest induction was 4.55 points. This study showed that documentaries could be used as a teaching and learning method because the documentaries had a positive effect on nursing students' recognition of nursing and satisfaction of education.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.155-170
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• 2018

Predicting a company's financial bankruptcy is traditionally one of the most crucial forecasting problems in business analytics. In previous studies, prediction models have been proposed by applying or combining statistical and machine learning-based techniques. In this paper, we propose a novel intelligent prediction model based on the simulated annealing which is one of the well-known optimization techniques. The simulated annealing is known to have comparable optimization performance to the genetic algorithms. Nevertheless, since there has been little research on the prediction and classification of business decision-making problems using the simulated annealing, it is meaningful to confirm the usefulness of the proposed model in business analytics. In this study, we use the combined model of simulated annealing and machine learning to select the input features of the bankruptcy prediction model. Typical types of combining optimization and machine learning techniques are feature selection, feature weighting, and instance selection. This study proposes a combining model for feature selection, which has been studied the most. In order to confirm the superiority of the proposed model in this study, we apply the real-world financial data of the Korean companies and analyze the results. The results show that the predictive accuracy of the proposed model is better than that of the naïve model. Notably, the performance is significantly improved as compared with the traditional decision tree, random forests, artificial neural network, SVM, and logistic regression analysis.

• Journal of Oriental Neuropsychiatry
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.251-263
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• 2019

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to review the clinical research trends in the treatment of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in Korean medicine (KM). Methods: We searched MEDLINE, CENTRAL, EMBASE, Google Scholar and five Korean databases through May 2019, for studies on KM to treat PTSD. Clinical research that conducted KM treatment of PTSD patients were included. Two researchers independently conducted study selection and data extraction process. Results: Totally, eight studies were included in this review. Types of traumatic events that patients experienced included physical violence/threatening, traffic accidents, sexual violence and personal tragic events. KM interventions performed included acupuncture, moxibustion, herbal medicine, physical therapy, and KM-based psychotherapy. Treatment duration varied from two days to more than five months. Follow-up began at least one week to three months after the end of treatments. It was reported that the major psychological and/or somatic symptoms of PTSD, such as anxiety, depression, insomnia, and musculoskeletal pain, subjectively improved, as well as other objective outcomes: Impact Event Scale-Revised Korean version (IES-R-K), Beck's Depression Inventory (BDI), State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, Hwabyung Symptoms/characters, Electroencephalography (EEG) change, etc. Statistical studies were conducted in three studies only. Outcomes such as Visual Analogue Scale (VAS), BDI, and IES-R-K showed statistically significant improvement after KM treatments. There was no study reporting adverse events during or after the interventions. Conclusions: According to this review, diverse types of KM treatments have been used among PTSD patients in eight studies. The KM treatments effectively improved psychological and somatic symptoms of PTSD patients. However, the lack of high quality research as well as the lack of standardization of KM treatments for PTSD are limitations. Further methodologically robust clinical trials should be performed, and the standardization of KM treatments for PTSD should be sought.

• Korean Journal of Legislative Studies
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.39-66
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• 2018

This paper analyzes the structures and issues of 2018 Korean local elections based on the author's observations on the electoral processes. Even if this paper does not follow a traditional statistical method, it provides the interpretative meanings of 2018 local elections by utilizing an expert's observations of campaign processes. This result of 2018 election can be summarized into two analytical frames. In terms of electoral competition structure, three key factors, such as presidential approval rating, party competition structure, ideological spectrum, tend to affect the winning of governing party. In the light of election issue, the inter-Korean summit, the Washington-Pyeongyang summit, Incheon deprecating remark were positive to the vote gains of governing party, but the negative campaign, the drucking scandal and the swing voters were found not to be significant. The local election in Korea tends to show dual meanings, a proxy war of national-level politics and a composition process of local government. This paper found that the 2018 election has dual meanings at the same time, in a sense that it is the punishment of the ex-governing party's wrongdoing and the power change of local government.

• Analytical Science and Technology
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• v.33 no.6
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• pp.262-273
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• 2020

A fluorine content analysis method for krill oils, which is a representative oil formulation in foods, was developed in compliance with the Korea Food and Drug Ministry's "Guidelines for Validation of Testing Methods Related to Food". Using this method for krill oils, the presence of impurities was evaluated via combustion-ion chromatography (C-IC). A review of published technical data on fluorine in krill oils showed that while the traditional wet potentiometric method was typically used, it was not reliable. Moreover, there was no food testing/analysis laboratory in Korea to perform a fluorine test analysis on such an oil matrix. Therefore, we identified halogen (fluorine) tests, developed to national and international standards, and developed a test method suitable for krill oils by selecting a C-IC method that is sufficiently applicable to the oil matrix. Based on the characteristics of the oil matrix, the optimal test method was established through various experiments by reviewing the concerns related to loss and interference in the preparation and introduction of samples. The fluorine content test was carried out on 11 krill oil products that were purchased online. Most products (with the exception of only one) were found to contain less than the reporting limit obtained by the test method. Furthermore, after additional testing, a high fluorine content of approximately 2,000 ~ 3,000 mg/kg was detected on the krill surface, although the concentration varied depending on the area of the krill. A comparison with samples from two ISO/IEC 17025 testing laboratories confirmed that there was no significant difference in the statistical analysis results obtained by ANOVA among the three laboratories. A testing guide for fluorine content analysis was completed.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.94-106
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• 2022

Background: The efforts to build more "people centered," "patient centered" health system has been emerging all over the world. Aligning with it, the Korean government is conducing the survey called "Medical Service Experience Survey (MSES)." There are critics, however, that MSES is not scrutinizing the medical experiences of patients in various healthcare settings. For this reason, this study aims to perform an empirical analysis of the differences in answers of patients responding to various healthcare settings. Methods: There are two steps in this study. First, explanatory analysis is conducted to compare the tendency of statistical concentration on questionnaires by divided healthcare settings. Second, confirmative analysis is carried out to evaluate the construct validity, reliability, and discriminant validity of the questionnaire in each healthcare setting. The raw data of MSES, which was conducted in 2020 by the Ministry of Health and Welfare in Korea and the Korean Institute for Health and Social Affairs is used. Results: As a result of exploratory factor analysis for all outpatients, the items were classified into four factors statistically: "doctor experience," "nurse experience," "outpatient service experience," and "patient satisfaction." It was confirmed that the reliability of all factors extracted was secured. However, for patients who visited hospitals, questionnaires related to personal privacy, such as "experiences on medical staffs considering physical exposure" or "experiences related to personal information exposure," were answered in conjunction with items of "nurse experience." Besides, patients responded that administrative elements of medical services, such as "experiences of comfort in medical institutions" and "experiences of satisfactory administrative services," were related to the items of "nurse experience." The answers of patients who visited traditional medical hospitals and clinics about "doctor experience" and "nurse experience" were not discerned statistically, and the answers to "doctor experience," "nurse experience," and "medical institution experience" were entangled with the responses of patients who visited dental hospitals and clinics. On the other hand, as a result of the confirmatory factor analysis, it was found that the inquiries of MSES generally had intensive validity. Conclusion: The collection of objective and scientific data is the prominent component to enlighten the patient-centered healthcare system alongside with change of the worldwide paradigm of measuring the healthcare system performance as follows the transition of perspective of health care from provider-centered to patient-centered. This study empirically shows that the patient experience can vary as the healthcare settings. Furthermore, to make an advance in measuring the experience of patients with medical services, this article proposes the deliberate consideration of the different kinds of healthcare settings and articulate design of the survey.