• Health Policy and Management
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.304-316
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• 2022

Background: As prevention of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) transmission in healthcare settings has become a critical component in its effective management, COVID-19 specific infection prevention and control (IPC) guidelines were developed and implemented by numerous countries. Although largely based on the current evidence-base, guidelines show much heterogeneity, as they are influenced by respective health system capacities, epidemiological risk, and socioeconomic status. This study aims to analyze the variations and concurrences of these guidelines to draw policy implications for COVID-19 response and future guidelines development. Methods: The contents of the COVID-19 IPC guidelines were analyzed using the categories and codes developed based on "World Health Organization guidelines on core components." Data analysis involved reviewing, appraising and synthesizing data from guidelines, which were then arranged into categories and codes. Selection of countries was based on the country income level, availability of COVID-19 specific IPC guideline developed at a national or district level. Results: The guidelines particularly agreed on IPC measures regarding application of standard precautions and providing information to patients and visitors, monitoring and audit of IPC activities and staff illnesses, and management of built environment/equipments. The guidelines showed considerable differences in certain components, such as workplace safety measures and criteria for discontinuation of precautions. Several guidelines also contained unique features which enabled a more systematic response to COVID-19. Conclusion: The guidelines generally complied with the current evidence-based COVID-19 management but also revealed variances stemming from differences in local health system capacity. Several unique features should be considered for benchmark in future guidelines development.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.85 no.4
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• pp.349-357
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• 2022

Background: The most consistently identified mortality determinants for the new coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) infection are aging, male sex, cardiovascular/respiratory diseases, and cancer. They were determined from heterogeneous cohorts that included patients with different disease severity and previous conditions. The main goal of this study was to determine if activities of daily living (ADL) dependence measured by Barthel's index could be a predictor for COVID-19 mortality. Methods: A prospective cohort study was performed with a consecutive sample of 340 COVID-19 patients representing patients from all over the northern region of Portugal from October 2020 to March 2021. Mortality risk factors were determined after controlling for demographics, ADL dependence, admission time, comorbidities, clinical manifestations, and delay-time for diagnosis. Central tendency measures were used to analyze continuous variables and absolute numbers (proportions) for categorical variables. For univariable analysis, we used t test, chi-square test, or Fisher exact test as appropriate (α=0.05). Multivariable analysis was performed using logistic regression. IBM SPSS version 27 statistical software was used for data analysis. Results: The cohort included 340 patients (55.3% females) with a mean age of 80.6±11.0 years. The mortality rate was 19.7%. Univariate analysis revealed that aging, ADL dependence, pneumonia, and dementia were associated with mortality and that dyslipidemia and obesity were associated with survival. In multivariable analysis, dyslipidemia (odds ratio [OR], 0.35; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.17-0.71) was independently associated with survival. Age ≥86 years (pooled OR, 2.239; 95% CI, 1.100-4.559), pneumonia (pooled OR, 3.00; 95% CI, 1.362-6.606), and ADL dependence (pooled OR, 6.296; 95% CI, 1.795-22.088) were significantly related to mortality (receiver operating characteristic area under the curve, 82.1%; p<0.001). Conclusion: ADL dependence, aging, and pneumonia are three main predictors for COVID-19 mortality in an elderly population.

• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
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• v.26 no.5
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• pp.1-8
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• 2021

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has affected the world seriously. Every person is required for wearing a mask properly in a public area to prevent spreading the virus. However, many people are not wearing a mask properly. In this paper, we propose an efficient mask detection system. In our proposed system, we first detect the faces of input images using YOLOv5 and classify them as the one of three scene complexity classes (Simple, Moderate, and Complex) based on the number of detected faces. After that, the image is fed into the Faster-RCNN with the one of three ResNet (ResNet-18, 50, and 101) as backbone network depending on the scene complexity for detecting the face area and identifying whether the person is wearing the mask properly or not. We evaluated our proposed system using public mask detection datasets. The results show that our proposed system outperforms other models.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Physical Medicine
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.23-30
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• 2021

PURPOSE: Physical therapists are at risk of becoming infected because they are in contact with or within 2 meters of the patient while treating them. The purpose of this study is to investigate the anxiety and depression of physical therapists during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and to identify the factors that affect anxiety and depression. METHODS: A cross-sectional survey was conducted during the pandemic. The survey were completed by 84 physical therapists in 24 local hospitals in Gwangju, South Korea. The Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD-7) scale and the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) were used to evaluate their anxiety and depression status. Logistic regression models were used to identify the general characteristics factors related to anxiety or depression. RESULTS: It was found that 40 (47.6%) respondents had anxiety, and 37 (44%) had depression. If there was a child under the age of seven in the physical therapist's family, a high probability of anxiety (p < .05) prevailed. Physical therapists in their 30s had a higher risk of depression than those in their 40s (p < .05). The risk of anxiety and depression in physical therapists who were with patients who did not wear masks was higher than for those who were with patients who wore masks (p < .05). CONCLUSION: The anxiety and depression status of physical therapists in Gwangju, South Korea, during the pandemic of COVID-19 was poor. It is necessary to wear a mask for all people during physical therapy.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.463-471
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• 2022

Purposes of this study were to identify the factors associated with behavioral Intention to social distancing (BItSD) in a loss versus gain advertising context. This study is a secondary analysis of data surveyed after randomly allocating one of the loss and gain message framing advertisements for the prevention of coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) infection to 379 adults aged 19 and over living in Korea in early March 2021. Attitude toward advertisement (𝛽=.03, p<.001), involvement in COVID-19 (𝛽=.14, p=.006) and emotional stigma (𝛽=-0.17, p<.001) were associated with BItSD, and the explanatory power of these variables was 19% (Adjusted R²=.19). Therefore, when health care professionals communicate with the public, they should develop the strategies to increase public people's involvement in the information and to induce positive advertising attitudes, and provide the effective messages to prevent stigma by accurate information.

• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.171-179
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• 2023

This study was conducted to evaluate the association between knowledge of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), perception of infection control and practice of infection control among dental hygienists. The questionnaires consisted of 9 demographic questions, 10 questions about COVID-19 knowledge, and 36 questions about perception and practice of infection control. The study analyzed 120 participants' data gathered from May 1 to May 31, 2021. For data analysis, T-test, ANOVA, and Pearson correlation were used. As a result, COVID-19 knowledge was 6.59 out of 10, the perception of infection control was 3.57 out of 4 and the practice of infection control was 3.55 out of 4. The COVID-19 knowledge(r=0.485) and perception of infection control(r=0.614) were significantly positively related to practice of infection control. To improve the practice of infection control in the dental field, education of infection control should be mandatory for dental hygienists. Also, the practice of infection control following "Dental Infection Control Standard Policy & Procedure" must be mandatory.

• KIPS Transactions on Software and Data Engineering
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.41-50
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• 2023

Recently, as the Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) prolongs along with the development of artificial intelligence technology, a non-contact society has become commonplace. Many companies are promoting digital transformation and the activation of artificial intelligence introduction to respond to this which leads to dramatic increase of demand for Chatbot. In addition, a Chatbot has reached the point of processing business transactions from responding simple inquiries. However, it is necessary to develop an API to interface with the legacy system and there are many difficulties in connecting. To solve this, it is becoming important to establish a hybrid Chatbot environment through RPA interface. Recently, the combination of RPA and Chatbot is considered an effective tool for handling many business processes. But, there are many difficulties due to the lack of interface cases and the difficulty in finding a method to development them. This study suggests a method for building a hybrid Chatbot which is an interface Chatbot(Conversational UX) and RPA(Task Automation) from the perspective of hyper-automation based on actual development cases and review of literature review is presented, so that the interface method can be understood and develop more easily. Therefore, there are implications for actively using AI Chatbot for digital transformation.

• Journal of Korean Public Health Nursing
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• v.36 no.3
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• pp.334-346
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• 2022

Purpose: This survey was conducted to investigate the level of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)-related peritraumatic distress and job stress among clinical nurses and evaluate their effects on nursing performance. Methods: The participants were 115 nurses from 5 hospitals in 3 regions in Korea. The peritraumatic distress index (PDI), job stress, and nursing performance scales were used for the analysis. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA, Pearson correlation coefficient, and multivariate regression analysis. Results: The level of peritraumatic distress of nurses was scored at 22.8 ± 9.26 (range 0 to 45). The level of job stress was scored at 2.69 ± 0.51 (range 1.3 to 3.7). The level of nursing performance was scored at 3.73 ± 0.51(range 1.76 to 5.0). Peritraumatic distress was observed to be positively correlated with job stress (r=.408, p<.001). However, peritraumatic distress and job stress were not correlated with nursing performance. In multivariate regression, the only variable seen to affect nursing performance was the work experience of the nurses. Work experience levels of five to fifteen years were observed to have a significant positive effect on nursing performance. Conclusion: The work experience of nurses directly influenced nursing performance during the pandemic period. Thus, to retain more nurses and to improve nursing performance, it would be necessary to develop various strategies to decrease their peritraumatic distress and job stress caused by the pandemic.

• Journal of Korean Public Health Nursing
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• v.36 no.3
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• pp.417-430
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• 2022

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to develop a respiratory infection prevention program for the rural elderly in the post-coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) era. Methods: The Delphi method was used to validate the contents of the program. Two rounds of Delphi surveys and one individual interview were conducted on four subjects and 16 categories with nine experts. Content validity was calculated using the content validity ratio (CVR) and coefficient of variation (CV). Results: This study verified the content validity of the existing program components, such as respiratory infection prevention characteristics, cough etiquette, correct hand washing, oral hygiene, correct tooth brushing, and exercise by walking. The study comprised 28 categories covering seven subjects, including the provision of knowledge and information about COVID-19, environmental management for respiratory infection prevention, and exercise training for immunity enhancement. Conclusion: This Delphi study examined the respiratory infection prevention program that was redesigned for the post-COVID-19 era and confirmed the validity of the educational contents. The findings of this study suggest that the program can be used practically for the prevention of respiratory infection among the rural elderly.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.55 no.6
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• pp.578-585
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• 2022

Objectives: This study aimed to adapt the survey questionnaire designed by Moens et al. (2021) and determine the validity and reliability of the Arabic version of the survey in a sample of the Saudi population experiencing teleworking. Methods: The questionnaire includes 2 sections. The first consists of 13 items measuring the impact of extended telework during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) crisis. The second section includes 6 items measuring the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on selfview of telework and digital meetings. The survey instrument was translated based on the guidelines for the cultural adaptation of self-administrated measures. Results: The reliability of the questionnaire responses was measured by Cronbach's alpha. The construct validity was checked through exploratory factor analysis followed by confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to further assess the factor structure. CFA revealed that the model had excellent fit (root mean square error of approximation, 0.00; comparative fit index, 1.0; Tucker-Lewis index, 1; standardized root mean squared residual, 0.0). Conclusions: The Arabic version of the teleworking questionnaire had high reliability and good validity in assessing experiences and perceptions toward teleworking. While the validated survey examined perceptions and experiences during COVID-19, its use can be extended to capture experiences and perceptions during different crises.