• International Journal of Quality Innovation
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• v.6 no.3
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• pp.1-18
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• 2005

This paper presents the empirical research results conducted in a Swedish care organization for elderly and handicapped. The objective of the research was to empirically assess the implementation and practices of a quality system (ISO 9000) from an organizational change and development perspective. The empirical data were collected through multiple methods; interviews were carried out with key-persons and leadership in the organisation and surveys were conducted to all employees. Interactive methods have been applied to various groups in the organisations e.g., directors, supervisors, and the leadership of the quality project and the local politicians. The empirical findings indicate, among others, that the implementation processes were received and perceived differently in the different parts of the care organisation due to different leadership strategies and employee involvement policies. Other critical factors such as acceptance, resistance, motivation, commitment, the role of leadership, learning possibility, etc. have also been investigated, analysed and discussed. Finally some recommendations on how to approach organisational change as well as strategies for implementing a quality system in the care sector are presented.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.54-61
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• 2018

Objective: The current study aimed to investigate the accessibility and usability of the disabled person while using the everyday facility. Background: The national laws regulated accommodation of persons with disabilities, but our knowledge on the practical usefulness of the laws and acceptance by the users is still far from complete. Method: Compliance with laws was checked throughout the actual measurement of 87 engineering designs in the facilities of a national university, and the practical usability of the facilities was investigated by in-depth interviews with eight disabled persons. New design solutions were developed by the anthropometric methodology for better accommodation. The target-specific anthropometry database such as sitting knee height with wheelchair was employed. Results: First, the statistic showed that 28.7% of facility designs comply with the law, 29.9% of facility designs doesn't comply with the law, and 41.4% of facility designs doesn't have related law or regulation. Second, the law of table height(71cm in current) can accommodate only 49.3% of wheelchaired population. The following test for 95% accommodation revealed that the table with 80cm high is required. Third, the current law in the door width(90cm) can only accommodate 82.6% of disabled persons, so the new design solution was calculated and suggested that 100cm in the door width is necessary for 99% accommodation of disabled persons. Conclusion: Even with the laws and regulations for the disabilities it was clear that the accessibility and usability of the disabled persons in everyday facilities was still limited. An investigation for the new solutions about a wide range of facilities is necessary for better practical accessibility and usability of the handicapped persons. Application: The results of current study can be a basement of developing a new guideline or regulation of the facility design for the disabled persons.

• Journal of rehabilitation welfare engineering & assistive technology
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.23-28
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• 2015

This study is to investigate the accessibility compliance status of smart devices for people with disabilities in the information age, smart and offer improvements. Vision of smart devices, operating systems (IOS, Android, Windows) based smart devices currently in use by most, hearing, investigation and provide handicapped accessibility status and improvement measures derived from a comparative analysis of the Disabled Accessibility Improvement of smart devices was presented.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 2006.04a
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• pp.261-263
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• 2006

Nowadays, technologies such as RFID, sensor network makes our life comfortable more and more. In this paper we propose a wearable computing system for blind and deaf person who can be easily out of sight from our technology. We are making a wearable computing system that is consisted of embedded board to processing data, ultrasonic sensors to get distance data and motors that make vibration as a signal to see the screen for a deaf person. This system offers environmental informations by text and voice. For example, distance data from a obstacle to a person are calculated by data compounding module using sensed ultrasonic reflection time. This data is converted to text or voice by main processing module, and are serviced to a handicapped person. Furthermore we will extend this system using a voice recognition module and text to voice convertor module to help communication among the blind and deaf persons.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 2004.05a
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• pp.102-104
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• 2004

Finger language is a typical tool for deaf persons. But learning the finger language for non-handicapped persons is very difficult. To overcome these difficulties, a new communication method using visual function is developed recently. Even though the developed system uses the visual function, it needs expensive equipments such as camera and computer. To be used in the real environments, the cost of equipments is a critical factor. If the recognition system for the finger language can be developed with low price equipments, the system can be used in the notebook or cellular phone. The image captured by PC camera was processed by preprocessing algorithm. To recognize the finger language, the resulting image was divide into $5{\times}5$ sections. The recognition system uses a similarity method and position information. The simulation results shows the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.

• Korean Journal of Artificial Intelligence
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.1-14
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• 2017

This research proposes a method to provide visually impaired persons with better medical services and to mitigate their difficulties in taking medicines in their daily lives. Normally, pharmaceutical information are distributed in a form of printed materials, but it is not accessible by those who are visually impaired. Since persons who are visually impaired by accidents or diseases are required to take more types of medicines compared to other handicapped persons, and thus it is an important matter to let them have appropriate medicines at the right time. Although there are several web sites which are run by the Ministry of Health and Welfare providing pharmaceutic information, the information on those web sites are duplicated and some of the menus are similar, and thus giving users difficulties and discomfort in finding appropriate pharmaceutical information. Since ontology can define and describe the resource in an information system more clearly, in this research, an ontology consists of pharmaceutical information and knowledge on medicines is constructed to give patients more precise information more efficiently. Also, a service in which users can have voice guidance on pharmaceutical information retrieve from the ontology-based information system by contacting RFID sticker on the medicine to the reader.

• The Journal of Korean Physical Therapy
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.161-171
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• 1998

Balance can be defined as the ability to maintain the body's center of gravity within the base of support with minimal sway. Falls occur frequently in the elderly persons by the physiological change and dysfunction with age. Injuries resulting from falls include soft tissue damage and fractures of the radius, humerus, and femoral neck other consequences of falls include decreased mobility, reduced confidence, long lies (which can give rise to hypothermia, dehydration and pneumonia), and death Risk factors for falls have beau classified as intrinsic (those related to the individual) and extrinsic(those associated with environmental features), Intrinsic factors include decreased strength, visual deficits, vestibular dysfunction, and decreased vibratory sensation in the feet. Improvement of the balance related to the increased probability for fells in the elderly persons and is important for fall preventions and improvement of the living quality ef the elderly persons

• Journal of the Korean Home Economics Association
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.13-28
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• 1989

With the purpose of identifying clothing for persons with special needs one of new directions in Clothing and Textiles, this pater comparatively analyzed current curriculum and research trends related to this field between Korea and America. Questionaire was distributed to 25 Korean colleges with Clothing and Textiles department and 4 American colleges known for special clothing study. Questions regarded the name of course, level (grade), number of credit houre, prerequisits and supporting courses, subjects of lecture and projects, way of managing lecture and projects, evaluation system, other special characteristics. Resources for analyzing research trends are Thesis and Dissertations in Clothing and Textiles, Research Journal of Clothing & Textiles/Home Economics Association, College Professors' research reports collection, of both Korea and America. Years of publications are 1972∼1986 (America), 1978∼1988 (Korea). Findings are as follows; 1. Clothing for special needs can be classified into various groups; Clothing for physically handicapped, mentally retarded, elderly, unusual-sized, pregnant/nursing mothers, institutionalized, protective clothing, uniform/career apparel. 2. Management of coursework related to special clothing has several common characteristics specially in America; Building-up coursework, problem-solving orientation, cooperative team-preject, interdisciplinary approach, client-versus-designer preference, community involvement. In Korea, a few school only has special clothing coursework and its scope of study was very limited. 3. Majority of research reports done with the subjects of special clothing had made for physically handicapped people and the elderly. Protective clothing and uniform have recently been paid much interests. 4. Researchers had mainly concerned on Design and Construction Aspects and nextly on social-psychological aspects. However, in America, selection and care aspects and marketing aspects of special clothing have been very procuctive issues recently. 5. Study on clothing for special needs has several opportunities to be stressed and improvements to be strengthened. Opportunities included active participation to the welfare of community society, strong publicity of accurate professional image, share with business and industry, interdisciplinary approach and new job market. Improvements were discussed in terms of strengthening supporting courses/prerequistes, intensifying interdisciplinary cooperation, provoking strong community involvement and securing financial support and research funds.

• International Journal of Railway
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.143-148
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• 2008

This paper is the output of a collaborative European project concerning the barrier free accessibility for disabled persons to regional and long distance trains in Europe. Disabled people represent around 13% of the population in Europe. This is approximately 63 million people. The range of disabilities includes people with reduced mobility including wheel chair users, viewing and hearing impaired people and other forms of impairment. Improving accessibility aims at contributing to the provision of public transport services to all citizens in an equitable way. The purpose of the project was to analyse and to evaluate the existing solutions at selected European railways for all required modules at the entrance (doors, information and safety solutions), to derive a design concept, to develop a mock-up in meeting the needs of rail travellers with the above mentioned impairments and to test it with user groups. The project also aims at deriving components for the determination of standards. The EUPAX Design Mock-up test was performed to verify the advantages of the layout of the train segment including the different modules such as access area (including the access door, gaps between platform and train as well as boarding aid devices), entrance vestibule, information systems inside and outside the train, emergency facilities, toilet with all conveniences and the additional test arrangements regarding push buttons, steps and emergency equipment. For this purpose a questionnaire was developed for the assessment of the EUPAX segment and the additional test arrangements. With the help of this questionnaire it was possible to execute a quantitative and qualitative evaluation. During three test phases 67 experts and handicapped persons from 6 countries have evaluated the Industrial Design mock-up based on this questionnaire. The test group covered persons from North (Denmark) to the South (Italy) and from the West (Spain) to the Middle of Europe (Germany). This is especially important for the generalization (harmonisation) of the results for all European countries. According to COST 335 the information for people with reduced mobility should be clear, concise, accurate and timely. So that all information can be received from persons, they must be transferred on at least two of the three possible ways (acoustical, visual, tactile), a so called "2-sense-principle". Based on the results ergonomic specifications/ solutions for the ergonomic design of the access area, the acoustic, visual and tactile information and the emergency devices including the emergency communication system were developed, related to the benefiting passenger groups.

• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.131-138
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• 2004

Considering international trends and foreign cases, it can be easily expected that web accessibility issue is becoming more and more important. While information technology has changed Korean society rapidly and widely, there are many People who have difficulties in using information services such as the elderly and persons with disabilities. One of the big barriers they face is the lack of accessibility of web services. These social problems have been rarely studied in Korea but surface as very import subjects to be addressed concerning IT and welfare policy. The objective of this study is to ensure web accessibility right for visually handicapped and reduce digital divide through development of a recommendation guideline of mobile internet user interface. In this study the trends of politics and laws related to web accessibility in developed countries are surveyed and some advisable recommendation guidelines of mobile internet user interface for visually handicapped to improve web accessibility are proposed.