• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.325-331
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• 2023

Background: Heat stress is a harmful physical hazard in many occupational settings. However, consequences of occupational heat exposure among workers in a sugarcane factory in Ethiopia are not well characterized. This study aimed to assess the level of occupational heat exposure-related symptoms and contributing factors. Methods: In this cross-sectional study, five workstations were selected for temperature measurement. Heat stress levels were measured using a wet-bulb globe temperature index meter. A stratified random sampling technique was used to select 1,524 participants. Heat-related symptoms were assessed using validated questionnaires. Results: The level of occupational heat exposure was 72.4% (95% CI: 70.2%-74.8%), while 71.6% (95% CI: 69.3%-74.9%) of participants experienced at least one symptom related to heat stress. The most common heat-related symptoms were swelling of hands and feet (78%), severe thirst (77.8%) and dry mouth (77.4%). The identified risk factors were a lack of reflective shields (AOR: 2.20, 95% CI: 1.53, 3.17), not-enclosed extreme heat sources (AOR: 1.76, 95% CI: 1.23, 2.51), a lack of access to shade (AOR: 9.62, 95% CI: 6.20, 14.92), and inappropriate protective clothing provision (AOR: 1.58, 95% CI: 1.27, 2.71). Conclusions: The burden of occupational heat exposure and heat-induced symptoms was high. Lack of reflective shields, the absence of enclosed extreme heat sources, a lack of access to shade, and inappropriate protective clothing provision were considerable attributes of heat stress. Therefore, the use of mechanical solutions to stop heat emissions at their sources and the key factors identified were areas for future intervention.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.35-47
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• 2024

Objectives: Many cases of lung cancer have been reported by school kitchen workers as occupational cancer. Twenty-eight schools in Gyeongsangnam-do Province were selected to evaluate the effect of improved kitchen ventilation systems. Ventilation characteristics before and after renovation were compared and design techniques were identified. Methods: In the design stage for kitchen ventilation systems, expert intervention was used to improve the designs. Ventilation characteristics and air quality were evaluated before and after the renovations. Hood face velocity and fan flow rate were measured and the smoke visualization technique was used to evaluate the capability of protecting worker's breathing zone. The concentrations of PM_0.3 were measured at points not adjacent to cooking equipment because these concentrations fluctuate greatly. Results: Mean hood face velocity increased from 0.29 m/s before renovation to 0.7m/s after renovation. The concentrations of PM_0.3 showed a roughly 95% reduction. Concentrations of CO showed more than a 75% reduction. Smoke visualization showed greater protection of workers' breathing zone. Conclusions: Advanced design techniques for school kitchen ventilation systems were applied to renovate old kitchen ventilation systems. The performance of the new kitchen ventilation systems was nearly excellent. Further improvement of design techniques is still needed, however.

• Physical Therapy Korea
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.55-64
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• 2016

Background: The International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health-core set (ICF-core set) for children and youth (CY) with cerebral palsy (CP) provides a useful conceptual framework and a guide for health care planning and measuring the changes brought by interventions across a multitude of dimensions from body functions to personal activities, social participation, and environmental factors for them. Objects: This single case study was reported to illustrate the use of a goal directed approach in applying the ICF-core set for CY with CP from a physical therapist perspective. Methods: An eleven year old boy with spastic CP, Gross Motor Function Classification System (GMFCS) level V, and his mother participated in an evaluation of his functioning state. The intervention goal was set through an interview using the ICF-core set, Canadian Occupational Performance Measure (COPM) and Goal Attainment Scale (GAS). Physical therapy was carried out on an outpatient basis using a goal directed approach for 30 min, 1 time/week during 12 weeks and the boy's gross motor function was assessed using the Gross Motor Function Measure (GMFM)-66 version (item set 2) before and after the intervention. Results: As measured by the boy's mother, the COPM score showed a meaningful clinical change (performance=mean 3.5, satisfaction=mean 2.5) and the T-score of GAS changed 34.4 after the goal directed approach. The GMFM-66 (item set 2) score changed from 31.8 to 38.7 and evaluation using the ICF-core set displayed improvement in 6 items of activity level between before and after the intervention. Conclusion: The ICF-core set for CY with CP is useful for understanding the overall functioning of CY with this condition and provides an opportunity to share and integrate information and opinions from different disciplines. We consider it as a useful tool in the universal language for the therapy and education of CY with CP.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.35 no.5
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• pp.907-917
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• 2015

Response to Intervention (RTI), which is focused on the gap between pre-interventions and post-interventions, provides an effective intervention program. This study takes under-achievement factors into consideration to determine the overall characteristics of underachievers. The under-achievement factors include cognitive learning factors, affective factors, and environmental factors. This study conducted curriculum-based assessments, achievement tests, and assessments on attitudes toward science and science learning motivation to verify the effects of individually tailored teaching according to the types of under-achievement in science. The experimental group was composed of six students in fourth grade, and the comparison group had 23 students. The findings of the study were as follows. First, the performance and progress of underachievers in the first-stage showed little progress and did not reach grade-level performance. Second, the underachievers in the second-stage greatly improved. In particular, the average of eight sessions in the second-step demonstrated performance beyond that of the regular child. Third, individually tailored teaching according to the types of under-achievement in science positively affected attitudes toward science and science learning motivation. This study will contribute to the improvement of the underachiever by applying individually tailored teaching according to the types of under-achievement in science.

• The Journal of the Korea institute of electronic communication sciences
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.887-896
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• 2018

The purpose of this preliminary study was to investigate the effect of fall prevention program on the occurrence of falls in inpatients at general hospital. Before the intervention, we identified the occurrence of the rate of falls in I hospital at Incheon and 190 patients received rehabilitation treatment. The causes of falls were carelessness of caregivers and therapists, increased burden of therapists, and height of beds. After recognizing the problems, the authors developed a fall prevention program through the PDCA model. The fall prevention program consisted of a video of fall prevention education and education for the patients and caregivers, environmental improvement and education of therapists for two months. After intervention, 230 patients were subjected to be included as analysis of the incidence of falls included As a result, the fall incidence was reduced by 34.1~66.7% in the pain clinic and 21.3~40.8% in the exercise clinic / department of occupational therapy compared to the before intervention. These findings show that the fall prevention program has a positive effect on the fall of inpatients, and it can be used as a model for fall prevention.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.53 no.5
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• pp.553-559
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• 2015

Research on micro-level assessment of the changes of socio-economic status following health interventions is very scarce. The use of household asset data to determine wealth indices is a common procedure for estimating socio-economic position in resource poor settings. In such settings information about income is usually lacking, and the collection of individual consumption or expenditure data would require in-depth interviews, posing a considerable risk of bias. In this study, we determined the socio-economic status of 213 households in a community population in an island in the north-western Tanzania before and 3 year after implementation of a participatory hygiene and sanitation transformation (PHAST) intervention to control schistosomiasis and intestinal worm infections. We constructed a household 'wealth index' based housing construction features (e.g., type of roof, walls, and floor) and durable assets ownership (e.g., bicycle, radio, etc.). We employed principal components analysis and classified households into wealth quintiles. The study revealed that asset variables with positive factor scores were associated with higher socio-economic status, whereas asset variables with negative factor scores were associated with lower socio-economic status. Overall, households which were rated as the poorest and very poor were on the decrease, whereas those rated as poor, less poor, and the least poor were on the increase after PHAST intervention. This decrease/increase was significant. The median shifted from -0.4376677 to 0.5001073, and the mean from -0.2605787 (SD; 2.005688) to 0.2605787 (SD; 1.831199). The difference in socio-economic status of the people between the 2 phases was highly statistically significant (P<0.001). We argue that finding of this study should be treated with caution as there were other interventions to control schistosomiasis and intestinal worm infections which were running concurrently on Kome Island apart from PHAST intervention.

• The Korean Journal of Applied Statistics
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• v.33 no.6
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• pp.697-712
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• 2020

New infectious diseases have broken out repeatedly across the world over the last 20 years; COVID-19 is causing drastic changes and damage to daily lives. Furthermore, as there is no denying that new epidemics will appear in the future, there is a continuous need to develop measures aimed towards responding to economic damage. Against this backdrop, the living population is an important indicator that shows changes in citizens' life patterns. This study analyzes time-based and socio-environmental characteristics by detecting and classifying changes in everyday life caused by COVID-19 from the perspective of the floating population. k-shape Clustering is used to classify living population data of each of the 424 dong's in Seoul measured by the hour; then by applying intervention analysis and One-way ANOVA, each cluster's characteristics and aspects of change in the living population occurring in the aftermath of COVID-19 are scrutinized. In conclusion, this study confirms each cluster's obvious characteristics in changes of population flows before and after the confirmation of coronavirus patients and distinguishes groups that reacted sensitively to the intervention times on the basis of COVID-related incidents from those that did not.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.26 no.12
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• pp.1355-1362
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• 2017

This study was performed to evaluate the possibility of application of lactic acid bacteria fermentation to increase the anti-allergic activity of the extracts from Houttuynia cordata Thunb. H. cordata Thunb was fermented on 25, 30, 35 and $40^{\circ}C$ for 5 days by two species of lactic acid bacteria, Leuconostoc mesenteroides 4395 and Lactobacillus sakei 383. The anti-allergic activity of water extracts of H. cordata Thunb was then analyzed both before and after fermentation. Anti-allergic activity was determined in vitro assays by using 5-lipoxygenase (5-LO), cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) and ${\beta}$-hexoseaminidase release of RBL-2H3 cells (degranulation marker). The extracts fermented at $35^{\circ}C$ by both bacteria had the highest inhibitory activities against 5-LO, and also higher than the control, and the one fermented at $30^{\circ}C$ by both bacteria had the highest inhibitory activity against COX-2. The degranulation of RBL-2H3 cells induced by IgE-antigen complex was estimated as ${\beta}$-hexoseaminidase release rate as reference of 100%, the release rates were inhibited in $25{\mu}g/ml$ of the extracts fermented at 30, 35 and $40^{\circ}C$ only by L. mesenteroides 4395. These results indicate that anti-allergic activity of H. cordata Thunb is increased by lactic acid bacteria fermentation.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Information and Commucation Sciences Conference
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• 2018.10a
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• pp.27-30
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• 2018

We design an expert system for tomato smart farm using decision trees and construct a control system with decision structure similar to that of farmers by using the data generated by factors that vary depending on the surrounding environment of each house. At present, Smart farm's control system does not control itself like the way farmers have done so far. Therefore, the dependency of smart farm control system is still not high. Direct intervention by farmers is indispensable for environmental control based on surrounding environment such as sensor value in smart farm. Therefore, we aimed to design a controller that incorporates decision trees into the expert system to make a system similar to the decision making of farmers. Prior to controlling the equipment in the house, it automatically selects the most direct effect among the various environmental factors, and then builds an expert system for complex control by including criteria for decision making by farmers. This study focused on deriving results using data without using heavy tools. Data is coming out of many smart farms at present. We expect this to be a standard for a methodology that allows farmers to access quickly and easily and reduce direct intervention.

• Nutrition Research and Practice
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.717-734
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• 2023

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: This study aimed to identify preschool children's eating behaviors associated with early childhood obesity and its multi-level, socio-ecological determinants. SUBJECTS/METHODS: In a cross-sectional study of 364 mothers of preschool children aged 3-5 years, these children's healthy eating behaviors were assessed using a validated preschool nutrition quotient (NQ-P) questionnaire. The children's overweight or obesity statuses were determined based on body mass index percentiles from the 2017 Korean National Growth Chart. The associations between the NQ-P score and risk of overweight or obesity were examined using multivariable logistic regression. The associations of individual, maternal, physical, and media environmental factors with the NQ-P score were also examined using multivariable linear regression. RESULTS: Preschool children with greater NQ-P scores were at a significantly lower risk of overweight or obesity (P < 0.01). The NQ-P score had a significantly positive association with maternal body mass index and an inverse association with household income (all P < 0.05). Maternal parenting and feeding practices exhibited associations with the NQ-P score. Positive associations were observed with "warm," "structured," and "autonomy-supportive" parenting as well as monitoring feeding practices (all P < 0.05). In addition, the NQ-P score had a significantly positive association with the childcare center's anti-obesogenic environment, such as the provision of nutritional and physical-activity support and vicinity of the built food environment to the home, including access to good-quality food, fruits and vegetables, and low-fat foods (all P < 0.05). Regarding media environments, the NQ-P score demonstrated more significant associations with viewing and eating and/or cooking content displayed on online video platforms (all P < 0.05) than with that on television. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings confirm the significance of healthy eating behaviors in early-childhood-obesity prevention and underscore the importance of multilevel maternal, physical, and media environmental interventions that effectively guide eating behaviors in preschool children.