• Korean Journal of Clinical Pharmacy
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.81-86
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• 2020

Background: The number of patients with dementia continues to increase as the age of aging continues to grow. Psychiatric symptoms caused by senile dementia are controlled using antipsychotics. However, these antipsychotics can lead to Parkinson's disease, and abuse of dopamine derivatives such as levodopa among Parkinsonian drugs can lead to psychosis. Therefore, we evaluated the patterns of prescribed antipsychotics and antiparkinsonian drugs in patients with senile dementia. Methods: We used data from the sample of elderly patients from the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service (HIRA-APS-2016). We analyzed the patterns of prescribing antipsychotics and antiparkinsonian drugs including prescribed daily dosage, period of prescription, and number of patients with both antipsychotics and antiparkinsonian drugs for senile dementia. Results: Among the 159,391 patients with dementia included in this analysis, 4,963 patients (3.1%) and 16,499 patients (10.4%) were prescribed typical and atypical antipsychotic drugs, respectively. The most frequently prescribed typical antipsychotic was haloperidol (4,351 patients with dementia), whereas the atypical agent was quetiapine (12,719 patients). The most frequently prescribed antiparkinsonian drugs were in the order of levodopa/carbidopa, benztropine, and ropinirole. In addition, 1,103 and 3,508 patients prescribed typical and atypical antipsychotics, respectively, were co-prescribed antiparkinsonian drugs. Conclusions: Atypical antipsychotics were the preferred prescription in patients with senile dementia. The prescription dose was relatively low; however, the average treatment duration was mostly long-term. Selection of antipsychotics and/or antiparkinsonian drugs should be made carefully in senile dementia and the causal relationship of adverse drug reactions needs further study.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.15
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• pp.6327-6332
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• 2014

National cancer registration reports provide a huge potential for identifying patterns and trends of important policy, research, prevention and treatment significance. As summary reports written on an annual basis, the China Cancer Registry Annual Reports (CCRARs) fall short from fully addressing their potential. This paper attempts to explore part of the patterns and trends hidden behind published CCRARs. It extracted data for cancer incidence rates (IRs) and mortality rates (MRs) for 2004, 2006 and 2009 from relevant CCRARs and portrayed 4 kinds of indicators in line graphs. The study showed that: a) all of the line graphs of age-specific IRs and MRs characterized typical "growth curves or histogram"; b) graphs of IRs and MRs for males and urban areas had higher peaks than that for females and rural regions; c) most of the line graphs of IR/MR ratios comprised a starting peak, a secondary peak and a decreasing tail and the secondary peaks for females and urban areas were higher than those for males and rural areas; d) most of the urban versus rural IR ratios valued above one, but most the urban versus rural MR ratios, below one; e) the accumulative IRs and MRs showed a stable increasing trend from 2004 to 2009 for urban areas, but mixed for rural regions.

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.169-175
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• 1997

The hypoglycemic and metabolic effects of Commelina communis L. extract were investigated in alloxan-induced diabetic rats. The increased blood glucose level in the diabetic rats was sinificantly lowered with the treatments of the plant protein extract. Administration of the plant extract ellicited the significant increase of glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD) activity in liver of alloxan-induced rats. Three isozyme patterns(band I, II & III : in order decreasing mobility) of G6PD were found when normal rat liver extract were subjected to electrophoresis on native polyacrylamide gel. On the other hand, G6PD band patterns of alloxan-induced rat liver extract were found band II isozyme missing. By treatment of plant extract in alloxan-induced rats has been showed pattern the recovery of missing band patterns. This indicates that changes of the G6PD isozyme might be related to the cellular process of diabetes.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.16 no.8
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• pp.3167-3172
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• 2015

Background: Understanding the history of human papilloma virus (HPV) infection is important for interpretation of a positive HPV DNA screening test, future work-up and treatment. We investigated the transition of HPV DNA test results in Korean women, and analyzed the association of cytology result with transition type. Materials and Methods: We retrospectively reviewed annual HPV DNA test results for 5,274 subjects between January 2005 and December 2012. Each subject had a minimum of five annual tests over the eight-year period. Based on the pattern of results, the transition type for each subject was assigned to one of the following: negative, persistent, latent, transient, and unclassifiable. Associations of cytology results with the HPV DNA transition types, number of positive results, and the durations of positive results were also analyzed. Results: The proportion of abnormal cytology findings decreased in the following order of transition patterns: persistent, latent, transient, and negative. Among transient patterns, a duration of three years or more significantly correlated with cytology results of non-high grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (HSIL; p<0.001). In the persistent group, duration of five years or more correlated with both non-HSIL and HSIL (p<0.001). Latent group showed no correlation with duration. Irrespective of patterns, having five or more positive results was significantly associated with HSIL (p<0.001). Conclusions: Our findings may contribute to better understanding of HPV infection, interpretation of HPV DNA screening results, and prediction of prognosis according to transition type.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.11 no.5
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• pp.819-824
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• 2001

The principal DNA modification systems of the amino-acid-producing bacteria Corynebacterium glutamicum AS019, Brevibacterium flavum BF4, and B. lactofermentum BL1 was investigated using two approaches; digestion of plasmid DNA isolated from these species TseI and Fnu4HI, and sequence analysis of the putative methyltransferase target sites following the derivatization of DNA using metabisulfite treatment. The C. glutamicum and B. flavum strains showed similar digestion patterns to the two enzymes, indicating that the target for cytidine methyltransferase recognizes 5'-GCSGC-3'(where S is either G or C). Mapping the methylated cytidine sites by bisulfite derivatization, followed by PCR amplification and sequencing, was only possible when the protocol included an additional step eliminating any underivatized DNA after PCR amplification, thereby indicating that the derivatization was not $100\%$ efficient. This may have been due to the high G0C content of this genus. It was confirmed that C. glutamicum AS019 and B. flavum BF4 methylated the cytidine in the $Gm^5CCGC$ sequences, yet there were no similar patterns of methylation in B. lactofermentum, which was consistent with the distinctive degradation pattern seen for the above enzymes. These findings demonstrate the successful application of a modified bisulfite derivatization method with the Corynebacterium species for determining methylation patterns, and showed that different species in the geneus contain distinctive restriction and modification systems.

• Proceedings of the Korea Society of Environmental Toocicology Conference
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• 2002.10a
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• pp.156-156
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• 2002

The goal of this study is to develop a biomarker used in monitoring abnormal behaviors of Japanese medaka (Oryzias latipes) as a model organism caused by hazardous chemicals that are toxic and persistent in the ecosystem. A widely used insecticide, diazinon (O, O-diethyl O- (2-isopropyl-4-methyl-6-pyrimidinyl) phosphorothioate), is highly neurotoxic to fish, and it is also well known that it causes vertebral malformation and behavioral changes of fish at relatively low concentrations. The fish behaviors were observed on a real time basis using an image processing and automatic data acquisition system. The genes potentially involved in the abnormal behaviors were cloned using suppression subtractive hybridization (SSH) technique. The untreated individuals showed common behavioral characteristics. When the test fish was affected by diazinon at a concentration of 0.1 and 1 ppm, some specific patterns were observed in its behavioral activity and locomotive tracks. The typical patterns were enhanced surfacing activity, opercular movement, erratic movement, tremors and convulsions as reported previously. The number of genes up-regulated tty diazinon treatment were 97 which includes 27 of unknown genes. The number of down-regulated genes were 99 including 60 of unknown genes. These gene expression patterns will be analyzed by the artificial neural networks such as self organization map (SOM) and multilayer perceptron (MLP), revealing the role of genes responsible for the behaviors. These results may provide molecular biological and neurobehavioral bases of a biomonitoring system for diazinon using a model organism such as fish.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.53 no.4
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• pp.371-377
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• 2015

Trichomonas vaginalis induces proinflammation in cervicovaginal mucosal epithelium. To investigate the signaling pathways in $TNF-{\alpha}$ production in cervical mucosal epithelium after T. vaginalis infection, the phosphorylation of PI3K/AKT and MAPK pathways were evaluated in T. vaginalis-infected SiHa cells in the presence and absence of specific inhibitors. T. vaginalis increased $TNF-{\alpha}$ production in SiHa cells, in a parasite burden-dependent and incubation time-dependent manner. In T. vaginalis-infected SiHa cells, AKT, ERK1/2, p38 MAPK, and JNK were phosphorylated from 1 hr after infection; however, the phosphorylation patterns were different from each other. After pretreatment with inhibitors of the PI3K/AKT and MAPK pathways, $TNF-{\alpha}$ production was significantly decreased compared to the control; however, $TNF-{\alpha}$ reduction patterns were different depending on the type of PI3K/MAPK inhibitors. $TNF-{\alpha}$ production was reduced in a dose-dependent manner by treatment with wortmannin and PD98059, whereas it was increased by SP600125. These data suggested that PI3K/AKT and MAPK signaling pathways are important in regulation of $TNF-{\alpha}$ production in cervical mucosal epithelial SiHa cells. However, activation patterns of each pathway were different from the types of PI3K/MAPK pathways.

• Journal of muscle and joint health
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.250-261
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• 2001

Alternative therapy for rheumatoid arthritis has become worldwide phenomenon this decade without scientific validation. This study was undertaken to explore the prevalence, patterns of use, and perceived efficacy of alternative therapies by patients attending a rheumatology clinic. We conducted a crossectional survey of 142 RA patients with structured questionnaire at outpatient rheumatic clinic from July to August in 2001. Results of this study were summarized as follows : 1. 85.9% of subjects were woman. Mean age was 49.97years, duration of rheumatoid arthritis was 5.6years. Mean pain score was 5.29cm. 2. 74.6% of subjects perceived rheumatoid arthritis as a controllable disease. 31% of patients combined medical treatments with alternative therapies. 58.5% of patients perceived that combining medical treatments with alternative therapies is the most effective strategy in controlling disease. 3. 77.5% had used more than one alternative therapy since the diagnosis was made. The major reason of discontinuation of use was no effect for the treatment of their disease. 4. 34.5% were currently using an alternative therapies and 50.9% were going to use alternative therapies in future. 5. 42.7% reported that alternative therapies was effective and only 3.6% reported side effects. 6. The perceived effect score was 3.14cm in general expecially the physiological score 2.91cm, psychological score 4.16cm. In conclusion, our results demonstrate a high use of alternative therapies by rheumatoid arthritis patients. And the perceived effect score of physiological aspect was not higher than one of psychological aspect. Therefore it should be considered in education program for the use of alternative therapies.

• Journal of Korean Neurosurgical Society
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• v.48 no.6
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• pp.506-517
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• 2010

Objective : We investigated whether Disability Evaluation (DE) situations influence patients' neuropsychological test performances and psychopathological characteristics and which variable play a role to establish an explanation model using statistical analysis. Methods : Patients were 536 (56.6%) brain-injured persons who met inclusion and exclusion criteria, classified into the DE group (DE; n = 300, 56.0%) and the non-DE group (NDE; n = 236, 44.0%) according to the neuropsychological testing's purpose. Next, we classified DE subjects into DE cluster 1 (DEC1; 91, 17.0%), DE cluster 2 (DEC2; 125; 23.3%), and DE cluster 3 (DEC3; 84, 15.7%) via two-step cluster analysis, to specify DE characteristics. All patients completed the K-WAIS, K-MAS, K-BNT, SCL-90-R, and MMPI. Results : In comparisons between DE and NDE, the DE group showed lower intelligence quotients and more severe psychopathologic symptoms, as evaluated by the SCL-90-R and MMPI, than the NDE group did. When comparing the intelligence among the DE groups and NDE group, DEC1 group performed worst on intelligence and memory and had most severe psychopathologic symptoms than the NDE group did. The DEC2 group showed modest performance increase over the DEC1 and DEC3, similar to the NDE group. Paradoxically, the DEC3 group performed better than the NDE group did on all variables. Conclusion : The DE group showed minimal "faking bad" patterns. When we divided the DE group into three groups, the DEC1 group showed typical malingering patterns, the DEC2 group showed passive malingering patterns, and the DEC3 group suggested denial of symptoms and resistance to treatment.

• The Journal of Advanced Prosthodontics
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.26-30
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• 2009

STATEMENT OF PROBLEM. Qualitative and semi-quantitative methods have been developed for TMJ sound classification, but the criteria presented are completely inhomogeneous. Thus, to develop more objective criteria for defining TMJ sounds, electroacoustical systems have been developed. We used Joint vibration analysis in the BioPAK system(Bioresearch Inc., Milwaukee, USA) as the electrovibratography. PURPOSE. The aim of this study was to examine the TMJ sounds with repect to frequency spectra patterns and the integral > 300 Hz /< 300 Hz ratios via six-months follow-up. MATERIAL AND METHODS. This study was done before and after the six-months recordings with 20 dental school students showed anterior disk displacement with reduction. Joint vibrations were analyzed using a mathematical technique known as the Fast Fourier Transform. RESULTS. In this study Group I and Group II showed varied integral > 300 /< 300 ratios before and after the six-months recordings. Also, by the comparative study between the integral > 300 /< 300 ratios and the frequency spectrums, it was conceivable that the frequency spectrums showed similar patterns at the same location that the joint sound occurred before and after the six-months recordings. while the frequency spectrums showed varied patterns at the different locations that the joint sound occurred before and after six-month recordings, it would possibly be due to the differences in the degree of internal derangement and/or in the shape of the disc. CONCLUSIONS. It is suggested that clinicians consider the integral > 300 /< 300 ratios as well as the frequency spectrums to decide the starting-point of the treatment for TMJ sounds.