• Journal of Fashion Business
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.143-155
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• 2022

The purpose of this study was to develop protective clothing that could alleviate fall impacts. Fall impact protection pants for elderly women were designed, and motion adaptable hip pads and knee pads printed by 3D printing were integrated into the pants and evaluated. First, the design of the fall impact protection pants with variable motion was semi-loose fitting pants that could be worn and detached from the protective pad. A pad pocket was made in the lining inside the pants so that the protective pad could be fixed to the protective area. Second, in the evaluation of the appearance of the fall impact protection pants, the wearer group had a good score of 4.60 or higher for all questions on color, material, ease, and fit. In the evaluation of the insertion method of the protective pad, the flexibility of the pad, and the weight of the pad, the subjects' scores were 4.30~4.80. The fit of the fall impact protection pants was excellent in the texture and elasticity of the outside and inside of the pants. There was no discomfort due to the pad(4.60), and no difficulty in movement during wearing activities was reported. During squatting, it was evaluated as 4.80, indicating that the motion adaptable hip joint and knee pads were highly effective during operation.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Costume
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• v.66 no.4
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• pp.45-60
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• 2016

Elderly women have a high risk of falling down in their daily lives. The purpose of this study is to develop protective pants for elderly women, which will mitigate the impact of falls, and play a major role in reducing injuries. The two types of design were proposed for development of protective pants by selecting pad insertion point and inserting lining for keeping pad in place through the checklist to investigate from the interviews with the medical workers and the investigation of the user requirement. Design A has protective pads in the hip, hip joint, and knee, while design B has protective pads in the hip and hip joint area. For the impact absorbing material, CR (chloroprene rubber) foam was selected for its flexibility, lightness, and impact absorbing capacity, and its pad shapes were designed to produce much flexibility in consideration of the activity and human body fitness of the wearers. Three kinds of pad types, which are the cut type, the porous type, and the honeycomb type, were proposed, and were manufactured to fit into the protective parts according to their design types.

• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.569-582
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• 2018

The purpose of this study is to verify the impact protection performance and to evaluate the activity, design, fit, and pad characteristics of the fall impact protection clothing for elderly women. The protective clothing was designed as pants type and underwear type, and an impact protection pad in the form of a tightly connected regular hexagon piece was inserted in the hip and hip joints. The pad was made of two kinds of foam single pad and foam and gel combination pad so that they could be inserted into pants type and underwear type, respectively. The results of the shock absorption performance of the fall impact protective clothing showed that when the impact force of 4601N was applied to the pants type protective clothing, the impact force was reduced by 29% in the foam pad type and 26% in the gel and foam pad type. When the force of 5113N was applied to the underwear type, it decreased by 40% in the foam pad type and by 34% in the gel and foam pad type. As a result of wearing evaluation of subject group, it was found that fit and activity of underwear type was better than that of pants type. Foam pad type was evaluated to be lighter than gel and foam pad type in both the subject and the expert group and the gel and foam pad was evaluated to be more flexible in the expert group.

• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.16 no.6
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• pp.945-953
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• 2014

This study aims to develop protective pants to relieve impact from falls and to present basic data for the development. The survey results are as follows; First, 45% of the respondents were in their 60s and 55% of them were in their over 70s and older. Also, 64% of them have fallen once for the past year and 36% of them have fallen twice or more. The older they were, the more there were those who have fallen twice or more. This indicated the older people has experienced more fall accidents again after a initial fall accident. Second, as per accident situations, the survey showed that fall accidents happened the most in the winter and in the afternoon (12-18 pm). Also, it happened on a street mostly and they were wearing sneakers or hiking boots when they got a hurt slipped in a front or side by missing their step in a walk. The injury areas are mostly knee and ankle. They had the bruises or a sprain in their knee and ankle mostly. The rate of bone fracture was 19.5%. Therefore, the protection area to falls in lower body is the knee. But hip and hip joint should be protected with knee as well because those are usually be broken when it is damaged. Third, approximately 80% of those who were hospitalized for treatment had surgery. Patients who had surgery were rather in their over 70s than in their 60s. The older they were, the more serious their fracture was. The period of hospital or outpatient treatment is more than three weeks in many cases. They responded their health got worse after falls. Aftereffects of accidents were physical discomfort, anxiety and medical costs. Falls to the old makes physical damage, psychological damage, which cause reduced physical activity and the increased cost of health care with economic losses. So it results on a negative impact on the life of the old. Fourth, elderly females were rarely aware of impact protective clothing and they have never purchased such clothing. For impact protective pants, the major consideration was suitable design for their body types. They liked casual style with front or side pockets and simple designs without any patterns or decorations. As per pants materials, they responded that they need functionality, activity and elasticity. Among the functional points, insulation of cloths are considered importantly, so the heat reservance of material in the impact protective pants should be considered carefully.

• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.101-110
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• 2014

In this study, we investigate characteristics of fall, requirements toward the impact protective clothing, design preferences, etc. to develop the fall impact protective clothing for the silver-aged women. Among the 242 women respondents aging 50s to 70s, 43% experienced the fall in recent 2 years. It is found that the fall mostly occurred in winter season and happened during the regular activities such as walking outside, going up and down stairs. Most of the respondents have no experience buying the impact protective clothing, but they expressed the fall impact protective clothing would help reducing the injury from falls. Moreover, the intention to purchase the impact protective clothing is increasing with an increasing target age. However, the respondents concerned with increasing volume and weight of clothing by the protecting pad inserted into the clothing. The respondents also claimed that the impact protecting clothing should not interfere with their regular physical activities. The survey showed that respondents preferred to embed the impact protective function in pants as a form of the protective clothing. For the design preferences on the pants, casual style and straight silhouette was preferred and stretch fabric was selected. The respondents preferred underwear made of cotton spandex blend with relaxed fit.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.41 no.4
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• pp.615-632
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• 2017

This study conducted a wearing evaluation of fall impact protective clothing developed in the previous study that evaluated activity, appearance, and practicality for elderly women. A total of 6 kinds of pants, which consisted of the three kinds of pads and two kinds of designs, were evaluated and the results are as follows. First, the activity of the protective clothing was tested with six women in their 60's and scored highly in most criterions that indicated satisfactory activity. The honeycomb type pad was superior in four of ten criterions for the activity evaluation results by pad types. Design B without a knee pad was evaluated as more comfortable on two motions that put pressure on the knee area. Second, the expert group considered design A to be better than design B, while the subject group preferred design B over design A in design appearance evaluation. Both the subject group and expert group evaluated that design A is better than design B in consideration of pads. Third, in the assessment of practicability, both the expert group and the subject group provided the highest score on the question of if elderly women needed protective clothing. The evaluation of washing ability indicated no noticeable change in the clothing form and size before and after washing.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.40 no.3
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• pp.495-505
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• 2016

This study explores and selects an appropriate material that considers light and soft physical properties as well as activity for impact absorption pads that can be used to develop practical impact protective clothes worn during daily life by the elderly to reduce the impact of falls. Physical properties, impact absorption performance, and compression characteristics were evaluated on 5 types of foam, 2 types of 3D spacer fabric, and 3 types of polymer gel to select a material appropriate for the pad to be inserted into impact protective clothes. The evaluation of the physical properties showed that 3D spacer fabrics had lower density compared to other materials and polymer gels had the highest density. The elongation percentage was higher in foams than 3D spacer fabrics and EPDM foam had the highest elongation percentage. The impact absorption performance of honeycomb polymer gel was better than foams and 3D spacer fabrics. As a result of looking into compression energy and compression characteristics of materials, 'CR foam A' was found to absorb the largest amount of compression energy, 24.1%, among foams and polymer gels. A high energy absorption rate of 50.0% (or above) was indicated by 3D spacer fabrics; however, foams and polymer gels showed a progressive deformation of energy compression / recovery curve with 3D spacer fabrics that showed drastic deformation. Based on characteristics of materials, 'CR foam C' and EPDM with relatively high absorption performance can be used as protective pad materials among foams. Among polymer gels, 2 open-type polymer gels that have relatively low impact protective performance but a relatively lighter weight on human body (compared to closed-type) are considered appropriate protective pad materials.

• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.422-428
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• 2018

In this study, we developed honeycomb pads using foam and polymer gel and verified the impact protection performance of pads for the development of a fall protection pants for elderly women aged 65 and over who have a high risk of fracture due to falls. The results are as follows; In the first experiment, the impact protection performance was evaluated for four honeycomb pad samples (CR foam, EPDM foam, hardness 15 polymer gel, and hardness 30 polymer gel) manufactured to a thickness of 5 mm using a single material. When the force of about 10757N was applied to the specimens, all four pads reduced the impact force to 3100N or less. Polymer gels showed better protection than foam materials. In the second experiment, the thickness of the protective pad was set to 8 mm in order to improve the shock absorbing performance of the protective pad. As a result of evaluating the impact protection performance of the foam single pad and foam gel composite pad, the impact absorbing performance of the foam single pad was better. Finally, four kinds of protection pads were made by assigning the foam single pad and the foam gel composite pad to pants type and underwear type respectively. The pad thickness of the main protection area was set to 8 mm to enhance the protection, and gradually decreased to 5mm and 3mm toward the edge to improve the appearance and fit.

• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.21 no.5
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• pp.606-617
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• 2019

The present study newly developed a firefighters' protective jacket and pants using a Nomex honeycomb structured layer (HPC) in cases of being exposed to flashover or flameover. This study evaluated the protective and comfort functions of an HPC compared to the current KFI firefighters' protective clothing (FPC). The results are as follows. First, thermal protective performance (TPP) of fabric layers was 2.75 times greater for HPC than FPC at $125kW/m^2$. Second, the predicted second and third degree burn areas were smaller for HPC than FPC when using a flame manikin. Third, thermal insulation using a thermal manikin was 0.2 clo greater for HPC than FPC. Fourth, there were no marked differences in maximal performance, mobility, and microclimate temperature/humidity between FPC and HPC through human wear trials. The thermal insulation of HPC was higher than that of FPC; however, any negative effect of HPC thermal insulation on the comfort functions for firefighters was not found. In conclusion, the newly-developed HPC provided more protection in reducing burn injuries from $125kW/m^2$, while no negative impact on maximal performance, mobility and thermal comfort functions of firefighters, which is appropriate for quick-evasive tactics at the flashover, flameover or back draft fires.