• Proceeding of Spring/Autumn Annual Conference of KHA
• /
• 2006.11a
• /
• pp.149-154
• /
• 2006

The purpose of this study is to introduce ubiquitous home services for the aged. In comparison with general ubiquitous homes, ubiquitous homes for the aged have two major characteristics. First, the service contents should be expanded and strengthened. Second, the services should be customized to each individuals. The primary objective of a ubiquitous home for the aged is health care. The three affordances for this objective are 1)prevention of sickness and reducing the speed of aging process, 2)technical assistance for disability, 3)recovering and enhancing the physical and cognitive function. For this purpose this paper analyses the characteristics of the aged and current ubiquitous technology and ubiquitous home service, thus providing an outline for ubiquitous services necessary for aged people.

• Journal of Korea Society of Digital Industry and Information Management
• /
• v.6 no.1
• /
• pp.69-81
• /
• 2010

Physical manifestations of aging due to the lack of exercise include the slowing down of motor learning, cardiopulmonary degradation, and the increasing difficulty to adapt to the environment. Aging is manifested with the lack of aerobic exercise work, decrease in muscular endurance, decline in skeletal and muscular strength, flexibility and agility, and the decrease in reaction speed and balance. Added to those are aging-related physiological changes, including the reduction of muscle bulk, increased body fat, decrease in total body water and basic metabolic rate as activities are reduced, and a decrease in cell and Lean Body Mass (LBM). These changes are known to cause problems. Interest and participation in appropriate physical activities among the elderly is needed to help them increase stamina, avoid diseases, maintain a clear intellect, and basically enable the elderly to live their daily lives as easy as possible. Therefore, physical activities are necessary for the elderly to enhance health-related factors. Special exercises should be performed for the enhancement of muscle function, muscle endurance, flexibility, agility, and balance. An accurate measurement of cardio-respiratory endurance and stamina through basic physical and cognitive characteristics of older adults is also required to ensure safety. Also, the development of a more scientific resistance exercise prescription system for the elderly is desperately needed.

• The Journal of the Convergence on Culture Technology
• /
• v.5 no.4
• /
• pp.349-354
• /
• 2019

Workers who die from falls at construction sites account for about 40 percent of the total number of deaths and are the main forms of accidents. In addition, as the nation's population structure is gradually aging, the rate of aging is increasing at construction sites, and the number of crashes due to decreased physical function and cognitive ability is increasing. Accordingly, we conducted a survey on the factors affecting the fall of older workers and would like to present more fundamental measures to prevent falls, focusing on older workers who are the victims of the disaster.

• 한국노년학
• /
• v.28 no.4
• /
• pp.925-940
• /
• 2008

As the proportion of old people in contemporary societies steadily increases, the influence on cognitive rehabilitation strategy of the memory deficit associated with normal and pathological aging grows greater as well. This paper reviewed the current memory rehabilitation techniques for older adults. In the first part of this article, human memory systems as a framework for understanding memory aging were considered. In the second part, research findings concerning memory performance in normal aging and Alzheimer's disease were reviewed. Finally, recent evidence for the kinds of memory rehabilitation procedures with proven efficacy were offered. The existent memory rehabilitation technique have focused on prompt of residual explicit memory, use of preserved implicit memory, utilization of memory external memory aids. A suggestion of memory training based on brain plasticity as a novel approach is offered.

• Molecules and Cells
• /
• v.40 no.9
• /
• pp.613-620
• /
• 2017

The most common form of senile dementia is Alzheimer's disease (AD), which is characterized by the extracellular deposition of amyloid ${\beta}-peptide$ ($A{\beta}$) plaques and the intracellular formation of neurofibrillary tangles (NFTs) in the cerebral cortex. Tau abnormalities are commonly observed in many neurodegenerative diseases including AD, Parkinson's disease, and Pick's disease. Interestingly, tau-mediated formation of NFTs in AD brains shows better correlation with cognitive impairment than $A{\beta}$ plaque accumulation; pathological tau alone is sufficient to elicit frontotemporal dementia, but it does not cause AD. A growing amount of evidence suggests that soluble $A{\beta}$ oligomers in concert with hyperphosphorylated tau (pTau) serve as the major pathogenic drivers of neurodegeneration in AD. Increased $A{\beta}$ oligomers trigger neuronal dysfunction and network alternations in learning and memory circuitry prior to clinical onset of AD, leading to cognitive decline. Furthermore, accumulated damage to mitochondria in the course of aging, which is the best-known nongenetic risk factor for AD, may collaborate with soluble $A{\beta}$ and pTau to induce synapse loss and cognitive impairment in AD. In this review, I summarize and discuss the current knowledge of the molecular and cellular biology of AD and also the mechanisms that underlie $A{\beta}-mediated$ neurodegeneration.

• Journal of the Korean Medical Association
• /
• v.61 no.12
• /
• pp.758-764
• /
• 2018

Dementia is a clinical syndrome characterized by a cluster of symptoms and signs that manifest as difficulties in cognitive functions such as memory, psychological and psychiatric changes, and impairments in activities of daily living. As a result of worldwide trends of population aging, dementia has had a huge impact on public health in almost all countries. Disease modification therapies for dementia have not yet been developed. However, pharmacotherapy is essential in patients with dementia to combat delays in their cognitive and functional decline. In this article, we review the current pharmacotherapy for dementia. Three acetylcholinesterase inhibitors-donepezil, rivastigmine, galantamine-and memantine are the only medications that have been approved for the treatment of dementia. We present the indications, dose recommendations, side effects, and criteria for National Health Insurance coverage in Korea of these medications for dementia treatment. Although the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety in Korea has not approved any medications for managing the behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia, some antipsychotics and antidepressants have been studied and used clinically for those purposes. Clinicians may consider vitamin E, Ginkgo biloba extract, choline alfoscerate, or omega-3 fatty acids as additional treatment options. Non-steroid anti-inflammatory drugs, estrogen hormone therapy, and statins are not generally recommended for dementia treatment. We believe that our findings will aid clinicians in the treatment of patients with cognitive decline.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Information and Commucation Sciences Conference
• /
• 2022.05a
• /
• pp.12-14
• /
• 2022

One of the most negative social changes of the last decade is population aging which leads to 19 times more patients with Mild Cognitive Disorder(MCI). It is well established that MCI is the most important state that can prevent dementia with early diagnosis and intervention. However, the social security system for patients with dementia is not working properly due to the coronavirus pandemic and the limited human power. This article proposes design principles for dementia training programs of extended reality devices. and The findings in this study provide a guide for considering the cognitive and physical and social functions of patients.

• Journal of Integrative Natural Science
• /
• v.11 no.3
• /
• pp.139-147
• /
• 2018

Hippocampal atrophy is a well-established imaging biomarker of Alzheimer disease (AD). However, hippocampus is a non-homogenous structure with cytoarchitecturally and functionally distinct sub-regions or subfield, with each region performing distinct functions. Certain regions of the subfield have shown selective vulnerability to AD. Here, we are interested in studying the effects of normal aging and mild cognitive impairment on these sub-regional volumes. With a reliable automated segmentation technique, we segmented these subregions of the hippocampus in 101 cognitively normal (CN), 135 early mild cognitive impairment (EMCI), 67 late mild cognitive impairment (LMCI) and 48 AD subjects. Thereby, dividing the hippocampus into hippocampal tail (tail), subiculum (SUB), cornu ammonis 1 (CA1), hippocampal fissure (fissure), presubiculum (PSUB), parasubiculum (ParaSUB), molecular layer (ML), granule cells/molecular layer/dentate gyrus (GCMLDG), cornu ammonis 3(CA3), cornu ammonis 4(CA4), fimbria and hippocampal-amygdala transition area (HATA). In this cross sectional study of 351 ADNI subjects, no differences in terms of age, gender, and years of education were observed among the groups. Though, the groups had statistically significant differences (p < 0.05 after the multiple comparison correction) in the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) scores. There was asymmetrical volume loss in the early stages of AD with the left hemisphere showing volume loss in regions that were unaffected in the right hemisphere. Bilateral parasubiculum, right cornu ammonis 1, 3 and 4, right fimbria and right HATA regions did not show any volume loss till the late MCI stages. Our findings suggest that the hippocampal subfield regions are selectively vulnerable to AD and also that these vulnerabilities are asymmetrical especially during the early stages of AD.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
• /
• v.16 no.7
• /
• pp.429-439
• /
• 2018

The objective of the study was to analyze difference in cognitive function according to social isolation level in elderly Korean. The author classified the social isolation into the structural isolation and contact isolation. Structural isolation corresponded to the no spouse or no children and the contact isolation corresponded to the absence of contact with children, friends or social association. Author conducted multivariate regression analysis with the elderly people aged 65 years or older from the 5th wave of the Korean Longitudinal Study of Ageing data. Number of sample was 3,971. It was confirmed that the level of cognitive function was lower according to level of social isolation. It was also confirmed that friends/neighborhood isolation, and social activity isolation showed significant relationships with cognitive functions. Based on the results, author suggested that to protect the elderly from negative effects of social isolation, we needed the policy to promote elderly's the participation in social activity. The study to analyze the factors related to social isolation was also needed.

• Korean Journal of Cognitive Science
• /
• v.24 no.2
• /
• pp.111-132
• /
• 2013

Previous research has shown that aging asymmetrically affects various functions in language. It is known that older adults show deficits in language production compared to young adults, while the performance in semantic processing is similar between older and young adults. The tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) phenomenon effectively reflects failure in retrieval of phonological knowledge. Older adults report TOTs more often than young adults and the cause of this phenomenon has been explained by two frameworks: the 'blocking hypothesis' and 'transmission deficit hypothesis'. This study examines the effect of aging on the retrival of phonological knowledge by inducing TOTs in the laboratory. Two variables were manipulated: age and word category. Participants were young and older adults, and stimuli was selected from 5 categories of words. After the participants read a definition about a target word, they reported three conditions: 'know', 'don't know', 'TOT'. The results were as follows: First, the older adults reported TOTs more often than the young adults. Second, TOTs occurred more in proper nouns such as names of persons and places. Third, in the category that TOTs occurred more often, there was a bigger age difference. Fourth, older adults reported fewer alternative words during TOT than young adults. Fifth, participants tended to report the partial information during TOT in characters. These results show the age-related difficulty in the retrieval of phonological knowledge in Korean. It is explained by the transmission deficit hypothesis and the characteristics of Korean orthography and phonology.