• Journal of International Academy of Physical Therapy Research
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.1746-1749
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• 2019

Background: Surgery has been known as an inefficient approach to reduce back pain in patients with lumbar spinal stenosis; therefore, non-surgical treatments are necessary. However, there has been little research to analyze the effect of non-surgical treatments on lumbar spinal stenosis pain. Objective: To identify the effectiveness of 2 physiotherapeutic treatment approaches to relieve pain due to lumbar spinal stenosis. Design: Randomized controlled trial Methods: The participants were 36 lumbar spinal stenosis patients who were randomized in the joint mobilization group (JMG) and transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation group (TENSG). Joint mobilization (JM) was conducted at the posteroanterior joint in the spinous process of the lumbar spine with stenosis. Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS) was applied on the lumbar spine with stenosis at a high frequency and intensity. Results: Visual analog scale (VAS) pain score significantly decreased in both groups, and the VAS value decreased more after JMG than that after TENSG. The pain thresholds of both groups also significantly increased, and that of JMG increased more compared to TENSG. In both the groups, significant improvements in VAS and pain thresholds were found, and JMG showed better results than TENSG. Conclusions: JM and TENS showed significant relief in both pain threshold and painpain, and JM showed more advanced relief compared to TENS.

• Journal of International Academy of Physical Therapy Research
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.1564-1570
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• 2018

The International Headache Society (IHS) has validated cervicogenic headache (CGH) as a secondary headache type that is hypothesized to originate due to nociception in the cervical area. CGH is a common form of headache and accounts for 15% to 20% of all chronic and recurrent headaches. CGH is commonly treated with manual and exercise therapy. To date, no studies have isolated only one manual intervention in an attempt to determine its effectiveness. In this case study we present a 28-year-old patient with right upper cervical (UC) and occipital pain who responded well to a single manual intervention technique. This technique was applied in isolation for the first three visits and two therapeutic exercises prescribed on the fourth and fifth visit. In total, manual and exercise intervention occurred over 8 visits at which point in time the patient was discharged with no UC motion impairments, an NPRS rating of 0, a NDI and HDI demonstrating a 100% improvement and a 37% improvement in FOTO score. The traction based manual intervention and two therapeutic exercises prescribed for this patient were successful in relieving UC pain and CGH. At six months follow up, the patient was still symptom free.

• Journal of Korean Medicine Rehabilitation
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.135-142
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• 2019

The objective of this study is to propose Korean Medicine treatment for recurrent limb weakness after Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS) improvement by intraveinous immunoglobulin, and to report its effectiveness. Manual muscle test (MMT), Korean modified Bathel index (K-MBI), and tendon reflex were used to evaluate the patient. The patient was improved hip joint, knee joint, ankle joint MMT from grade 3-/3- to grade 5/5 and in the upper limb the patient can do big joint exercise but cannot do micromovement like writing or using cell phone. When discharge date the patient's wrist joint MMT grade is improved grade 5-/5- to grade 5/5. The K-MBI score is improved from 71 to 86 and there was a big change in walking and chair/bed transfer, there was no change in tendon reflex. This study suggests that Korean Medicine can be effective for patients who have recurrent limb weakness after GBS improvement.

• KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.1981-1995
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• 2021

When a person tries to conceal emotions, real emotions will manifest themselves in the form of micro-expressions. Research on facial micro-expression recognition is still extremely challenging in the field of pattern recognition. This is because it is difficult to implement the best feature extraction method to cope with micro-expressions with small changes and short duration. Most methods are based on hand-crafted features to extract subtle facial movements. In this study, we introduce a method that incorporates optical flow and deep learning. First, we take out the onset frame and the apex frame from each video sequence. Then, the motion features between these two frames are extracted using the optical flow method. Finally, the features are inputted into an improved MobileNetV2 model, where SVM is applied to classify expressions. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the method, we conduct experiments on the public spontaneous micro-expression database CASME II. Under the condition of applying the leave-one-subject-out cross-validation method, the recognition accuracy rate reaches 53.01%, and the F-score reaches 0.5231. The results show that the proposed method can significantly improve the micro-expression recognition performance.

• The Korean Journal of Pain
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.114-123
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• 2021

Background: Evaluation of the effectiveness of caudal epidural injection on pain, spine mobility, disease activity, and activity of daily living in axial spondyloarthritis (SpA) patients. Methods: A total sample of 47 patients were registered in this study. They were randomly assigned into 2 groups; Group I received caudal epidural injections, ultrasound-guided, with 1% lidocaine hydrochloride mixed with triamcinolone, whereas Group II did not receive any injections. All participants fulfilled the ASAS criteria for axial SpA. Outcome measures were as follows: visual analogue scale, Oswestry disability index (ODI), modified Schober test, lateral lumbar flexion, and Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Score (ASDAS) with assessment at baseline, 2 weeks, and 8 weeks post-treatment. This clinical trial was registered on clinicaltrials.gov under the number NCT04143165. Results: There was a significant difference between both groups regarding pain, ODI, spine mobility and ASDAS scores in favor of group I. This effect was at its maximum after 2 weeks. Despite the decline of this effect after 2 months, the difference between the groups remained significant. Higher disease activity, younger age, and shorter disease duration were associated with better outcomes. Conclusions: Epidural injection of lidocaine and triamcinolone is a cost effective and a practical technique for controlling pain, as well as improving the function of the spine and disease activity scores in axial SpA patients with acceptable complications and relatively sustained effect.

• International Journal of Computer Science & Network Security
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.23-28
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• 2022

The present study has been conducted to evaluate the experience in using peer-to-peer platforms and immersive technologies in the training of future masters of pharmacy from the Pharmaceutical Faculty of Bogomolets National Medical University, Ukraine. The selected participants were given the pre- and post-test containing multiple choice questions to assess the effectiveness of immersive technologies. Further, a self-designed structured questionnaire contained 10 questions with 5 options was delivered to consented participants through email and WhatsApp. The results of test presented that students attained an average of 26% in their pre-test while the average attained score post-test was 74% that showed a significant improvement with peer-to-peer platforms and virtual reality technology. The results of survey questions also showed an overall 86.73% satisfaction for the use of peer-to-peer platforms and virtual reality technology in the training of future masters of pharmacy. These results demonstrated that 90.81% showed agreement that they gained a high level of confidence through peer-to-peer platforms and virtual reality to handle patients in clinical practice. It can be concluded that participants of this study showed a strong agreement with positive experience in using peer-to-peer platforms and virtual reality technology in the training of future masters of pharmacy in medical lyceum.

• Physical Therapy Rehabilitation Science
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.113-118
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• 2022

Objective: This study was conducted to investigate the effect of heel-raise-lower exercise on spasticity, strength, and gait speed after the application of tapingin patients with stroke. Design: Randomized controlled study Methods: The participants were randomly divided into the heel raise-lower exercise+taping (HREx+T) group and the heel raise-lower exercise (HREx) group, with 20 participants assigned to each group. Both groups performed heel lifting exercise 100 times a day 5 times a week for 6 weeks. HREx+T group additionally applied taping to the plantar flexor muscles. The spasticity of the ankle plantar flexors was measured using the composite spasticity score. A handheld dynamometer and a 10-m walk test were used to measure plantar flexor strength and gait speed, respectively. Results: Spasticity was significantly more improved in the HREx+T group than in the HREx group (p<0.05). Similarly, plantar flexor strength was significantly more improved in the HREx+T group than in the HREx group (p<0.05). Moreover, participants assigned to the HREx+T group showed significantly greater improvement in gait speed than those in the HREx group(p<0.05). Conclusions: Thus, heel-raise-lower training combined with taping may be used to improve the spasticity, muscle strength and gait speed in stroke patients.

• Medical Lasers
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.45-48
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• 2021

Background and Objectives Among the numerous available therapies, the usefulness of laser treatment has been proven in melasma, especially for refractory to topical agents or chemical peels. This study evaluated the effectiveness of 694-nm wavelength fractional toning ruby laser in melasma presenting on the malar area. Materials and Methods This was a retrospective study of 40 melasma patients treated with 694-nm wavelength ruby fractional toning laser for a total of 8 cycles at intervals of 2 to 3 weeks. Two independent investigators assessed the photographic findings and evaluated the severity of melasma by applying the Melasma Severity Scale (MSS). Subject satisfaction score was also surveyed at every visit. Results After the 4th treatment, subjects were continuously satisfied with their results. At the 8th visit and 1-month after the last treatment, MSS was determined to be significantly improved as compared to the first visit. One case of minor hypopigmentation was reported, but was resolved after one month. Conclusion Application of 694-nm wavelength fractional toning ruby laser for treating melasma on the malar area showed significant improvement in the MSS. Moreover, the treatment could be repeatedly applied, with low complication rate and significant patient satisfaction.

• Journal of the Korean BIBLIA Society for library and Information Science
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.189-207
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• 2023

This study focused on the public library evaluation indicators in 2022 to examine the changes and improvement recommendations. In addition, this study analyzed the results of changes in the proportion between the qualitative and quantitative evaluation. Eventually, there was a comparison between the current and previous evaluation outcomes. Furthermore, we examined the effectiveness of the current evaluation groupings of libraries. Then, we tried to discover new quantitative evaluation variables that affected the evaluation score calculation. Finally, we proposed a method for estimating variables through standardization and individualization, as well as a scheme to encourage the voluntary participation of public libraries in the evaluation.

• Journal of Forest and Environmental Science
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.290-301
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• 2022

Increasing life expectancy leads to a rise in the prevalence of aging-related mental diseases and a concomitant increase in the financial and societal pressures related to their prevention and management. This issue is attracting increasing attention from researchers. Therefore, this study aimed to determine whether a healing program in a forest environment is effective for improving cognitive function, depression, anxiety, and stress in elderly people. A nonequivalent control group pretest-posttest design was used. The experimental group consisted of 18 males and females aged 60 to 80 years who participated in a forest healing program for seven days, while the comparison group comprised 10 people with similar demographics. For the process of data analysis, this study performed a cross-analysis to determine the homogeneity of the data and carried out the Wilcoxon signed-rank test, a nonparametric statistical test, to verify the significance of each group. Participation in the forest healing program led to a significant improve-ment in cognitive function (p=0.030). The levels of depression decreased, but this result was not statistically significant. The levels of anxiety decreased significantly (p=0.004). The mean cortisol score, a measurement of stress, decreased, but it was not statistically significant. These findings confirmed the effectiveness of this program for improving certain mental conditions of elderly people, and affirmed that the use of long-term forest healing programs can be expected to alleviate national pressures created by aging societies.