• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.11-19
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• 2013

Backgrounds: Occupations are grouped on the basis of similarity in tasks and duties performed. Standard occupational classification (SOC) is a tool for organizing all professions into a clearly defined set of groups according to the tasks and duties undertaken in the respective jobs. Objectives: The major objective of this study is to comprehensively review how a SOC system is used in occupational and safety fields such as surveillance, exposure monitoring, occupational epidemiological study, management of carcinogens and analysis of occupational accidents. Methods: We summarized the cases, policies and regulations used in SOC systems in advanced countries and as they appear in articles Results: We found that SOC systems have been widely used in various areas of occupational safety and health in the US, the UK, Finland, and the EU. In general, it is highly common to use SOC in the analysis of occupational accidents and diseases and to identify factors causing those accidents. The SOC system is also used not only for surveillance of exposure to hazardous agents and occupational health, but to manage carcinogens. In order to adjust the effects of a particular job, SOC is used in the general population health area. The Ministry of Employment and Labor (MOEL) has never used or introduced an SOC system. There have been no cases of the application of a SOC system to either the occupational safety and health field or to health surveillance for the general population in Korea. Conclusions: We suggested a need to introduce an SOC system in several occupational safety and health activities, such as work environment measurement, analysis of occupational accidents, specific physical examination and surveillance systems, etc.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.485-501
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• 2023

Objectives: The Ministry of Employment and Labor has revised the articles regarding management of the thermal environment in the workplace. Currently, two types of regulations exist together with indoor workplaces as the scope of application. It appears that the time has come to discuss regulations. In this study, we aim to identify the feasibility of and problems with the current system through a comparative legal review of workplace thermal environment management laws from around the world. We suggest directions for improving South Korea's workplace thermal environment management laws. Methods: For the several selected countries, we analyzed the classification and content of obligations stipulated for the thermal environment, the presence or absence of specific measures for thermal environment management, legal status and content, and the scope of application of thermal environment provisions and measures. The investigated content was classified according to Zweigelt-Kotz's legal theory. Results: In some countries, employers' obligations for regulating the thermal environment are broadly divided into two types: results and actions. The scope of application of provisions and measures on the thermal environment was extensive, with most of the selected countries targeting general workplaces. Conclusions: In the case of South Korea, restricting and classifying target workplaces and imposing separate obligations to manage a workplace thermal environment goes against global practices, and stipulating legal orders and separate action obligations in guidelines does not conform to the characteristics of South Korea's legal system, meaning that improvement is needed.

• Environmental Analysis Health and Toxicology
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• v.31
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• pp.20.1-20.7
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• 2016

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.9-20
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• 2013

OSHA(Occupational Safety and Health Act) generally regulates employer's business principles in the workplace to maintain safety environment. This act has the fundamental purpose to protect employee's safety and health in the workplace by reducing industrial accidents. Authors tried to investigate the correlation between 'occupational injuries and illnesses' and level of regulation compliance using Survey on Current Status of Occupational Safety & Health data by the various statistical methods, such as generalized regression analysis, logistic regression analysis and poison regression analysis in order to compare the results of those methods. The results have shown that the significant affecting compliance factors were different among those statistical methods. This means that specific interpretation should be considered based on each statistical method. In the future, relevant statistical technique will be developed considering the distribution type of occupational injuries.

• Korean Journal of Occupational Health Nursing
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.205-221
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• 2007

Purpose: This research was to investigate the level of importance and performance of daily-activity and environment management related to workplace health promotion and knowledge and opinion of law and regulation related to workplace health promotion. Methods: The subjects were 218 occupational nurses all over the country. Questionnaires were made by the researcher. Data were collected from September 18 to October 20, 2006 and analyzed by SPSS WIN 12.0. Results: Prevention of accident and emergency treatment got the highest score in the awareness of importance. Regular check-up got the highest score in performance level. Providing and wearing of the personal protective equipments got the highest score both importance and performance level. In occupational nurses' knowledge about law and regulation, ratio of correct answer was 55 percentages that was low intellectual level. The mandatory employment of occupational health nurse or occupational nurse in 50 - 500 person workplaces got the highest score in revision opinion of law and regulations. Conclusion: Result of these studies will provide baseline data for selecting the order of priority according to awareness of importance of daily-activity, environmental management and law and regulation in the occupational health promotion and operating health promotion program.

• Korean Journal of Occupational Health Nursing
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.76-85
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• 2015

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to identify knowledge structure of the Korean Journal of Occupational Health Nursing from 1991 to 2014. Methods: 400 articles between 1991 and 2014 were collected. 1,369 keywords as noun phrases were extracted from articles and standardized for analysis. Co-occurrence matrix was generated via a cosine similarity measure, then the network was analyzed and visualized using PFNet. Also NodeXL was applied to visualize intellectual interchanges among keywords. Results: According to the results of the content analysis and the cluster analysis of author keywords from the Korean Journal of Occupational Health Nursing articles, 7 most important research topics of the journal were 'Workers & Work-related Health Problem', 'Recognition & Preventive Health Behaviors', 'Health Promotion & Quality of Life', 'Occupational Health Nursing & Management', 'Clinical Nursing Environment', 'Caregivers and Social Support', and 'Job Satisfaction, Stress & Performance'. Newly emerging topics for 4-year period units were observed as research trends. Conclusion: Through this study, the knowledge structure of the Korean Journal of Occupational Health Nursing was identified. The network analysis of this study will be useful for identifying the knowledge structure as well as finding general view and current research trends. Furthermore, The results of this study could be utilized to seek the research direction in the Korean Journal of Occupational Health Nursing.

• The Journal of Korean Academy of Orthopedic Manual Physical Therapy
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.11-22
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• 2023

Background: This study examined the relationship between the empowerment, and occupational professionalism of physical therapists, and the factors affecting their job satisfaction. Methods: The subjects of the study were 240 physical therapists who had worked at medical institutions for more than a year. Data were collected from April 1 to 30, 2022. Results: The mean scores for job satisfaction, empowerment, and occupational professionalism were 3.43±.52, 3.60±.60, and 3.74±.40 points, respectively. Empowerment was positively correlated with occupational professionalism (r=.75, p<.001) and job satisfaction (r=.59, p<.001). Also, occupational professionalism was positively correlated with job satisfaction (r=.68, p<.001). The factors influencing job satisfaction were empowerment (β=.17, p<.05) and occupational professionalism (β=.56, p<.001), showing an explanatory power of 48%. Conclusions: The results of this study revealed that the higher the empowerment and occupational professionalism, the higher the job satisfaction of physical therapists. To improve their job satisfaction, it is, therefore, necessary to develop and apply an effective program to improve their empowerment and occupational professionalism level. These research results can be useful as basic data for improving the job environment of these therapists and the policies relating to their work.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.229-242
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• 2013

Objectives: This study was designed to investigate the current status of the association of job-related information such as employment status, workplace environment, and hazard material exposures with health examination outcomes. Methods: The study used data from KNHANES 2007-2009 representing the three years of 2007-2009, which was conducted annually using a rolling sampling design that involved a complex, stratified, multistage, probability-cluster survey of a representative sample of the non-institutionalized civilian population in Korea. The final analytical sample consisted of 17,240 participants. Information on age, education, smoking history and alcohol intake was collected during the health interview. Job related information consisted of employment status, workplace environment, and hazardous material exposure. The selected indices of health examination were blood pressure, fasting glucose, blood cholesterol, HDL, SGOT, SGPT, and BUN. Results: In multiple logistic regression analysis using hypertension and pre-hypertension as dependent variables and job related categories as independent variables after covariate adjustments, the odds of hypertension and pre-hypertension were significantly lower in those with responsibility and power in their job activities. Interestingly, low odds for hypertension were observed among those who reported that their jobs were fast-paced. Conclusions: This study confirmed that some job-related categories in employment status, workplace environment, and hazardous material exposure had an association with health outcome status. It is worthwhile to comment that high responsibility and power in job activities were revealed as one of the important favorable factors to improve health condition of workers.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.271-277
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• 2019

Objectives: A 46-year-old woman who had worked on cleaning stainless steel containers with Initially unknown powders died from acute silicosis. To determine whether the acute silicosis was related to his work environment, we conducted exposure assessment the level of exposure to respirable crystalline silica(RCS) during cleaning stainless steel containers with unknown powders. Methods: The exposure assessment of RCS were undertaken according to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health(NIOSH) method 7500. The components of the unknown powder were analyzed using X-ray Diffraction. Results: The unknown powder was found to be natural diatomaceous earth, which contained 12% and 9% quartz and cristobalite, respectively, crystalline silica. In the case of cleaning stainless steel containers with diatomaceous earth powder, the primary measurement resulted in 1.3 times higher occupational exposure limit of MOEL(in sum of quartz and cristobalite concentration) and 3.9 times higher in secondary measurement. The workbench was equipped with a local exhaust system, but because there was no hood at the end of the duct, the wind speed at the opening of the duct was 12 m/sec, whereas the controlled wind speed at the working position was only 0.3 m/sec below the legal standard. Conclusions: There is an urgent need to install the hood, conduct safety and health education for employers and workers, and periodically monitoring and manage the working environment.

• The Journal of Korean society of community based occupational therapy
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.47-56
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• 2013

Objective : The objective of this study was understanding the procedure of self-care training in occupational therapy and exploring experienced occupational therapists' perspectives in self-care training Method : A phenomenological study design was used to collect information regarding use of self-care training among occupational therapists working in a different settings. The data collection process was conducted by using a structured interview and survey. Result : The self-care training strategies used by occupational therapists were summarized to four main themes; 1. Different strategies for different age group, 2. Design therapeutic strategy rely on client's natural environment, 3. Use of theoretical background: occupation-based or client-centered, or both. 4. Use of self-awareness stragety; using different method to reflect self-awareness. Conclusion : The self-care training is not just simply conduct ADL training but understanding client's age, environment, theoretical background, and self-awareness of the client. Through eatablishing understandable self-care training strategy according to client's age and environment, the more effective self-care training would be possible.