• Proceedings of the Zoological Society Korea Conference
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• 1999.10b
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• pp.18-18
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• 1999

No Abstract, See Full Text

• Korean Journal of Biological Psychiatry
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.245-250
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• 1996

This research was performed to find out the changes of serotonin receptors in the platelet of alcoholics. Using $_{125}I-LSD$ as a radioligand. We obtained the following results. 1) In the comparison of patients vs controls, $B_{max}$ of the former was significantly higher than that of the latter(P=0.0017). But there was no significant difference in the Kd between the two groups. 2) In the comparison of type 1 vs type 2, alcoholics by cloninger's classification $B_{max}$ of the latter was significantly higher than that of the farmer(P=0.0396). But there was no significant difference in the Kd between the two groups. 3) In the comparison of alcohol abuse vs alcohol dependence, there were no significant differences in the value of $B_{max}$ and Kd between the two groups. These results support the hypothesis of serotonin-deficit in alcoholism. Furthermore, it can be inferred that the increase of platelet serotonin receptors in alcoholics might be used as a trait marker.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.37
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• pp.67-88
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• 1999

The purpose of this study was to identify the proportion of the population with the alcohol use disorder among the Korean adults. To the author's knowledge, this study was the first social work article to survey the prevalence of the alcohol use disorder using the randomly selected sample. The survey instrument included the Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test, the Brief Michigan Alcoholism Screening Test. and the Korean Alcoholism Screening Test to identify the rates of problem drinkers and alcoholics. The instrument also included items to ask the respondents' drinking frequencies, drinking amounts, and heavy drinking. The findings of the study indicated that Koreans had severe alcohol problems. 322 percent of the respondents were identified as those who have experienced drinking-related problems in the past year. This study found 4.2 percent of the respondents as alcoholics and estimated that 1.34 million of the Korean adult population were alcoholics. This study concludes that social workers should use screening tools to early identify clients with alcohol problems and develop effective programs to assist those clients and their families. Finally this study provide suggestions for future studies.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.230-238
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• 2013

This research purposes to investigate parameters which effect on the relapse of alcoholism, to understand psychological factors for stress control and drinking anticipation which lead to the relapse of female alcoholism and to seek practical ways in social welfare for alcoholism, focusing on the traumatic experiences and post traumatic stress symptoms of female alcoholics experienced physical, sexual abuses. The main results of this research can be summarized as follows. First, the characteristic related with physical, sexual traumatic experiences of subjects is that physical, sexual abuses by acquaintances under 18 is more common than that experiences over 18. Second, the 8 pathes among 10 direct pathes are statistically significant. Third, as the result of verification of indirect effects through parameters, in the model, 4 out of 6 indirect pathes parameterized as post traumatic stress symptoms, problem focused coping, and drinking anticipation are significant. Based on these results, the practical implications for the warning of relapse of female alcoholics had been discussed.

• Clinical and Molecular Hepatology
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.358-366
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• 2018

Severe acute alcoholic liver disease (SAAH) unresponsive to medical therapy shows one-year-mortality rates of up to 90%. Most transplant centers request six months of alcohol abstinence prior to transplantation, the so-called "6-month rule." This regulation is not based on strong evidence, repeatedly making it a topic of controversial debates. The majority of patients with SAAH will die before fulfilling the 6-month rule. Therefore, liver transplantation (LT) protocols are becoming more flexible towards the rigid abstinence regulation, especially concerning SAAH patients. We conducted a literature review regarding LT in SAAH and its outcomes, including post-transplant mortality and recidivism. We studied available data on PubMed from 2011 and onwards whilst including articles dealing with genetic components, medical therapy and historic snapshots of alcoholism. Emerging studies recommend LT in SAAH not responding to medical therapies even without realizing the required abstinence period, since the majority of these patients would die within 6 months. SAAH without response to medical therapy has one-year-mortality rates of up to 90%. The 6-month rule is not based on strong evidence and is repeatedly a topic of controversial debates. There is genetic linkage to alcoholism and medical therapy is not as effective as estimated, yet. The 6-months-regulation has not shown to evidently decrease the risk of recidivism post-LT, which is a lifesaving treatment in SAAH patients. Insisting on rigid sobriety rules results in excluding patients with a low risk of recidivism from being transplanted. Moreover, the genetic linkage of alcoholism must be recognized.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.56 no.3
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• pp.37-59
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• 2004

Short Michigan Alcoholism Screening Test for Fathers(F-SMAST) and Mothers(M-SMAST) is to measure the presence of an alcohol use disorder in one's father and/or mother. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the Korean version of the F-SMAST and M-SMAST. A total of 241 college students, who resided in Seoul and two other cities, participated in this study. The internal consistency of the Korean version of the F-SMAST and M-SMAST was assessed using alpha coefficient. The alpha coefficient of both the F-SMAST and the M-SMAST was 0.82. Standard Errors of Measurement(SEM) were also computed. SEMs of the F-SMAST and the M-SMAST were quite low. With a cut-off score of 3, the F-SMAST correctly identified 91 percent of respondents who were presumed to be children of alcoholics and correctly identified 81 percent of respondents who were presumed not to be children of alcoholics. Sensitivity and specificity of the M-SMAST with a cut-off score of 1 are 0.33 and 0.81, respectively. Several variables were examined in relation to the F-SMAST and the M-SMAST to examine convergent and discriminant validity. It was found that the F-SMAST and the M-SMAST were significantly correlated with most of convergent variables(average amount of drinking per day, AUDIT, distress) and had not statistically significant relationships with discriminant variables(demographic variables). This study suggests that the Korean version of the F-SMAST and the M-SMAST be repeatedly assessed across different sample in order to confirm the findings of this study.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.38 no.3
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• pp.205-212
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• 2002

This study was conducted to develop a method for direct determination of phagocytic activities in human circulatic systems and to measure the phagocytic activities in human leukocytes from the alcoholics, since phagocytic activity was considered to be very important in human immune mechanism at early stage for the health care of the alcoholics. The subjects for this study were 130 among which 95 males and 3 females were diagnosed as alcoholism and 32 was healthy blood donors. A thin layer of heat-killed Staphylococcus aureus Cowan I was placed on a plastic dish and reacted with whole blood to measure the phagocytic plaque formation by human leukocytes. In order to determine the health conditions of the subjects, some clinical laboratory tests, such as white blood cell counts, hemoglobin contents (Hgb), mean corpuscular volume of red blood cells(MCV), serum electrophoresis, B and T-lymphocytes, T-lymphocyte subtypes and phytohemagglutination test were also implemented. Compared to the non-alcoholism, new and old alcoholic inpatients showed statistically significant differences on levels of Hgb and MCV (p<0.05), but showed that T and B-lymphocyte numbers decreased and Helper T cell/Suppressor T cell ratio ($1.6{\pm}0.8$%) increased. Compared to non-alcoholism, phagocytic plaque activities of leukocytes from alcoholic patients decreased significantly and an unusual pattern in phagocytic plaque was observed, showing a strange body and chain shaped phagocytosis. Based upon these results, it is concluded that a phagocytic-plaques of Staphylococcus aureus Cowan I by leukocytes was very simple and useful method for the early immunological determination of phagocytic activities in alcoholic patients without requiring any special equipments.

• Journal of Community Nutrition
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.60-65
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• 1999

Chronic alcoholism often leads to folate deficiency. In recent years it has been reported that mild elevation of plasma homocysteine (Hcy) is associated with an increased risk of coronary artery disease. In the present study we investigated the effects of chronic ethanol consumption on folate status and the relation between plasma folate and Hcy. A human study was conducted to determine plasma folate, total Hcy, cysteine(Cys), total cholesterol and hemoglobin(Hb) concentrations in 44 Korean alcoholics(men aged 30 to 50yr) and 45 Korean non-alcoholic subjects(men aged 30 to 50 yr). In alcoholic subjects, 52.6% were folate deficient and 34.2% were marginally deficient, which suggested that most alcoholics were subnormal in folate status. Plasma total Hcy concentration of alcoholics was twice as high as in control subjects (p<0.001). We found a negative correlation between plasma folate and plasma total Hcy(r=-0.271, p<0.05) and a positive correlation between plasma folate and plasma Cys(r=0.249, p<0.05) in total subjects. Hb concentrations in alcoholics was significantly lower than in control subjects, but there was no difference in total cholesterol concentration between alcoholics and controls. These results suggest that chronic alcohol consumption may impair the disposal of Hcy by interfering with folate metabolism.

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.53-59
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• 2016

Alcoholism is a significant health problem in the world. The liver is the first and primary target organ for alcohol metabolism. Alcohol dehydrogenase and aldehyde dehydrogenase play important roles in the metabolism of alcohol and aldehyde. In this study, I aimed to investigate the eliminatory effects of a Phellinus spp. extract on alcohol metabolism in drunken Sprague-Dawley (SD) rats. Male SD rats were given Phellinus spp. extract at 30 min after 40% (5 g/kg) alcohol ingestion. To assay the effect of Phellinus spp. extract on blood alcohol concentration, blood samples were taken from the tail vein at 1, 3 and 5 h after alcohol ingestion. The concentrations of alcohol, alcohol dehydrogenase, and aldehyde dehydrogenase in Phellinus spp. extract treated rat were significantly lower than that of the control with a time-dependent manner. In addition, the alanine aminotransferase and aspartate aminotransferase activities of Phellinus spp. extract-treated groups were altered compared to those of the control group. These results suggest that Phellinus spp. extract intake can have a positive effect on the reduction of alcohol, alcohol dehydrogenase, and aldehyde dehydrogenase concentrations in the blood and may alleviate acute alcohol-induced hepatotoxicity by altering alcohol metabolic enzyme activities. Phellinus spp. extract is thus a good nutraceutical candidate.

• BMB Reports
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.146-150
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• 1996

A 2.1 kb cDNA clone for rat transketolase was isolated from rat liver ${\lambda}gt11$ cDNA library and its sequence was determined. The predicted rat transketolase (655 amino acids with $M_r$ 71,186) is highly similar (92%) to that of the human enzyme except that it contains an extra 32 amino acids at its N-terminus. Although it is less similar (<27%) to transketolases from non-mammalian species, the functional motifs such as the catalytic sites and thiamine binding domain are well conserved in the rat enzyme. Southern blot analysis of genomic DNA verified that transketolase appears to be derived from a single gene. Immunoblot and Northern blot analyses suggested that hepatic transketolase was activated pretranslationally by a 2.1-fold while little change was observed in brain enzyme, indicating a tissue-specific pretranslational activation during postnatal development.