• Korean Journal of Clinical Pharmacy
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.89-96
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• 2013

This article aimed to introduce 'risk sharing' schemes for pharmaceuticals between drug manufacturers and healthcare payer. Published literature review was undertaken to summarize risk sharing concepts and collect information on existing scheme examples in other countries focusing on new anticancer drugs. Risk sharing schemes could be categorized into health outcomes-based and non-outcomes (financial) based ones. Outcome-based schemes could be broken down into performance-linked reimbursement and conditional coverage. Performance-linked reimbursement can be further broken into outcomes guarantee and pattern or process of care and conditional coverage included coverage with evidence development and conditional treatment continuation schemes. Non-outcome based schemes included market share and price volume at population level, and utilization caps and manufacturer funded treatment initiation at patient level. We reviewed the fifteen examples for anticancer drugs that risk sharing agreements in response to the inherent uncertainties and increased costs of eleven anticancer drugs. Of them, eight cases were coverage with evidence development schemes. The anticancer drugs except bevacizumab and cetuximab were all listed on the national health insurance formulary in Korea, with reimbursement criteria defined on the basis of approved indications and administrations. Risk sharing approach may be a useful tool to ensure values for drug expenditure, but there are a number of concerns such as high administration costs, lack of transparency and conflicts of interest, especially for performance-based health outcomes reimbursement schemes.

• Journal of Korean Clinical Nursing Research
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.39-51
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• 2012

Purpose: Thisstudy was conducted with an aim to get a kind of prioritiesin developing the evidence-based nursing practice guidelines in fields. Methods: This study utilized a two-round Delphi surveys from November to December, 2010 with self-administered questionnaires which had a scale ranged from 0 to 9. A total of 95 head nurses working at the forty different general hospitals was asked to evaluate the priorities in four criteria; patient coverage, certainty, improvement in patient outcome and in nursing practice (first round) and 65 head nurses were asked to decide the importance of the criteria afterwards (second round). Results: The relative importance of 4 criteria was 22.3% in patient coverage, 26.5% in certainty, 23.5% in improvement of patient outcome, and 27.7% in improvement of nursing practice as the results of the 1st round and 20.6%, 26.6%, 24.8%, and 28.0% for the 2nd round, respectively. Top five nursing practices showed high scores after considering the relative importances of the 4 criteria were medication, intravenous therapy, checking vital sign, pain management, and diagnostic test or procedures care. Conclusion: It is recommended to take into account of the priorities that were found in this study when someone intends to develop a evidence-based nursing practice guideline.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.263-271
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• 2018

Health technology assessment (HTA) is defined as multidisciplinary policy analysis to look into the medical, economic, social, and ethical implications of the development, distribution, and use of health technology. Following the recent changes in the social environment, there are increasing needs to improve Korea's healthcare environment by, inter alia, assessing health technologies in an organized, timely manner in accordance with the government's strategies to ensure that citizens' medical expenses are kept at a stable level. Dedicated to HTA and research, the National Evidence-based Healthcare Collaborating Agency (NECA) analyzes and provides grounds on the clinical safety, efficacy, and economic feasibility of health technologies. HTA offers the most suitable grounds for decision making not only by healthcare professionals but also by policy makers and citizens as seen in a case in 2009 where research revealed that glucosamine lacked preventive and treatment effects for osteoarthritis and glucosamine was subsequently excluded from the National Health Insurance's benefit list to stop the insurance scheme from suffering financial losses and citizens from paying unnecessary medical expenses. For the development of HTA in Korea, the NECA will continue exerting itself to accomplish its mission of providing policy support by health technology reassessment, promoting the establishment and use of big data and HTA platforms for public interest, and developing a new value-based HTA system.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.272-279
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• 2018

Since the introduction of new health technology assessment in 2007, benefit coverage process of health insurance related to new health technology has become an upgraded system through the evidence-based decisions. As a result of enforcing this system for 10 years, however, there have been several rising concerns. It needs to support the insufficient evidence of medical technologies, introduce reassessment system for post management of market entry technologies, and improve evaluation methods and process. In addition, there is the possibility of emerging an unheard-of medical technology, fused various categories like artificial intelligence, robot, information technology, physics and life science in the fourth industrial revolution. Now, new updated system introduced to improve new technology assessment, such as 'limited health technology assessment system,' 'system for postponement of new health technology assessment,' 'one-stop service system,' and 'integrated operation of approval for medical devices and new health technology assessment.' Therefore it needs to prepare the improvement plan for new health technology assessment to be established more advanced system, and we have to resolve concerns by communication with various healthcare experts and patients now and for ever.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.33-52
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• 2009

Health promotion policies have needed to assess in detailed and evidence-based work to set a policy goal and clear future directions of health promotion in Korea. To identify the major factors related with health promotion, we assessed the associations between public health outcome (potential years of life loss, PYLL) and national health determinants. For this purpose, we used a pooled cross sectional time-series regression analysis with corrected fixed effect models involving sixteen member countries of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development during the period 1970 to 2001. The PYLL was positively associated with tobacco and alcohol consumption (model 1 and 2) and calories intake (model 2 and 3) while the PYLL was negatively associated with GDP, fruit and vegetable intake (model 2), number of doctors (model 3), coverage rates of health care security, and elderly population rates (model 4). In conclusion, health behaviors related with tobacco, alcohol, and nutrition were significant health determinants for health outcome. Overall analysis results of this study will provide a guidance toward improved macro- and micro-policy development for future health promotion policy in Korea.

• The Journal of Korean Medicine
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• v.38 no.3
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• pp.143-159
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• 2017

Objectives: The aim of this study was to investigate the current status of and seek for measures to activate Korean medicine in stroke care. Methods: This is an e-mail survey targeting the members of Korean medical doctors registered at the association of Korean medicine. The project team of the society of stroke on Korean medicine for the development of clinical practice guideline for stroke has devised the items for the questionnaire. The survey was conducted for 15 days in November 2016. Results: The percentage of the respondents who have treated patients with stroke for the past month was 11.2% in the acute phase, 20.5% in the convalescent phase, and 32.4% in the chronic phase. Approximately 80% of the respondents answered they had a decrease in the number of patients compared to 10 years ago, regardless of the stroke phase. Most of the respondents were using Western medicine together with traditional Korean medicine for physical examination. Acupuncture and herbal medicine were the main therapeutic interventions. The two measures chosen by the most respondents to activate the Korean medicine usage for stroke care were the expansion of the insurance coverage (34.9%) and the generation of evidence on the effectiveness of traditional Korean medicine (25.1%) Conclusion: It is necessary to actively show the role of the Korean medicine through the establishment of the evidence on the effectiveness of Korean medicine and the promotion based on the evidence. In addition, optimal treatment methods should be derived based on the traditional knowledge and modern scientific research and the methods should be educated to every Korean medical clinics and hospitals so that they can be implemented in clinical practice. At the same time, the government should provide policy support to ensure that the optimal treatment can be timely and appropriately implemented.

• Communications for Statistical Applications and Methods
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.211-226
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• 2017

The chain-ladder method, for which run-off data is employed is popularly used in the rate-adjustment and loss-reserving practices of non-life-insurance and health-insurance companies. The method is applicable when the underlying assumption of a consistent development pattern is in regards to a cumulative loss payment after the occurrence of an insurance event. In this study, a modified chain-ladder algorithm is proposed for when the assumption is considered to be only partially appropriate for the given run-off data. The concept of a structural-change point in the run-off data and its reflection in the estimation of unpaid loss amounts are discussed with numerical illustrations. Experience data from private health insurance coverage in Korea were analyzed based on the suggested method. The performance in estimation of loss reserve was also compared with traditional approaches. We present evidence in this paper that shows that a reflection of a structural-change point in the chain-ladder method can improve the risk management of the relevant insurance products. The suggested method is expected to be utilized easily in actuarial practice as the algorithm is straightforward.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.89-121
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• 2005

This paper investigates the empirical relationship between investment and uncertainty using the firm level data of Korean manufacturing sector. Empirical results show that uncertainty is negatively correlated with investment only for the post-crisis sample period. In particular, the negative effect of uncertainty on investment is more significant for low interest coverage ratio firms, high debt-asset ratio firms and small firms. The results are consistent with the claim that firms act in a more risk-averse manner after the financial crisis. This paper also finds a significant sensitivity of investment to cash flows only for the pre-crisis sample period, suggesting that financial constraint is not relatively important in explaining low investment after the financial crisis.

• Journal of the Korean Medical Association
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• v.61 no.12
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• pp.702-705
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• 2018

Advances in technology lead to advances in medical devices, and these advances have the positive effect of creating opportunities for beneficial developments in healthcare, such as innovating traditional healthcare processes or expanding opportunities for diagnosing and treating diseases. Nonetheless, device developers, suppliers, users, insurers, and patients all face the challenge of balancing patient safety and health effectiveness with a reasonable profit. In Korea, the New Health Technology Assessment system aims to introduce safe and effective health technology, but this is only effective for the entry of devices onto the healthcare market. This system is not enough for creating a healthy ecosystem in which high-quality technologies and devices survive in the market and naturally exit from the market if not successful. The nation must not lag in the rapid development of medical devices, but the concomitant requirement for patient safety is like two rabbits moving in different directions. There is not enough time to resolve each source of uncertainty for both developers and users. The early adoption of health technologies, including medical devices, offers new opportunities for treatment and diagnosis, but also poses unexpected health risks. Thus, we need to design a plan to generate scientific evidence related to medical devices after they introduced into practice. Additionally, regarding the use of individual medical devices, we believe that the creation of a healthy ecosystem for medical devices by implementing medical device surveillance culture is a way to manage the opportunities and risks of the early introduction of innovative medical devices.

• Molecules and Cells
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• v.41 no.10
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• pp.881-888
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• 2018

During the cortical development, cells in the brain acquire somatic mutations that can be implicated in various neurodevelopmental disorders. There is increasing evidence that brain somatic mutations lead to sporadic form of epileptic disorders with previously unknown etiology. In particular, malformation of cortical developments (MCD), ganglioglioma (GG) associated with intractable epilepsy and non-lesional focal epilepsy (NLFE) are known to be attributable to brain somatic mutations in mTOR pathway genes and others. In order to identify such somatic mutations presenting as low-level in epileptic brain tissues, the mutated cells should be enriched and sequenced with high-depth coverage. Nevertheless, there are a lot of technical limitations to accurately detect low-level of somatic mutations. Also, it is important to validate whether identified somatic mutations are truly causative for epileptic seizures or not. Furthermore, it will be necessary to understand the molecular mechanism of how brain somatic mutations disturb neuronal circuitry since epilepsy is a typical example of neural network disorder. In this review, we overview current genetic techniques and experimental tools in neuroscience that can address the existence and significance of brain somatic mutations in epileptic disorders as well as their effect on neuronal circuitry.