• Journal of Korean Academic Society of Home Health Care Nursing
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.16-29
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• 2024

Purpose: This scoping review aimed to synthesize the characteristics and effects of interventions designed to prevent unintentional home injuries in older adults in Korea. Methods: The review was conducted following the Joanna Briggs Institute protocol. A literature search was performed for studies published between 2001 and 2022 in the DBPia, RISS, KMBase, and NDSL databases. A total of 1,620 studies were identified, and 27 studies were included in the final analysis. Data were analyzed for characteristics of the literature, intervention-related unintentional injury mechanisms, and safety areas. Results: Most selected studies utilized a quasi-experimental design and targeted elderly women. In terms of injury mechanisms, 21 of 27 studies focused on falls, 2 on fire/disaster, 3 on drugs, and 1 on food. The most common preventive intervention for falls was exercise, and its effectiveness was verified using physical safety variables. Interventions in the fire/disaster, drug, and food domains were all educational, and changes in knowledge, behavior, and attitude were verified. Conclusion: This study confirmed the effectiveness of interventions for preventing unintentional injuries in the homes of community-dwelling older adults. These findings can serve as a foundation for developing and implementing unintentional injury prevention interventions at home for community-dwelling older adults. Multidisciplinary research is needed to address multifaceted safety issues by considering the home environment and injury risk factors.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.21 no.5
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• pp.433-442
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• 2020

This study established the relationship between job stress and burn-out syndrome of firefighters. The research targets were 582 firefighters who worked at five fire stations in the D metropolitan city. The survey was conducted using a self-administered questionnaire during the period from July 1st 2019 to September 30, 2019. On the correlation analysis, burn-out showed a significant positive correlation with job stress. On the results of the logistic regression anaylsis, the risk ratio of high levels of burn-out was significantly higher in the very high stress groups than that in the groups with low job stress. According to the multiple regression analysis, the factors having an influence on burn-out were gender, age, the specific level of job career, shift work, the physical burden of work, the sense of satisfaction with the work, consideration for quitting the job and job stress. These findings suggest that the job stress of firefighters is closely related to burn-out. This demands the development and implementation of programs that can properly control and curb the factors of job-stress.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.112 no.3
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• pp.303-321
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• 2023

To develop the Forest Work Load Index (FWLI) for estimating the work intensity of forest workers, a study focused on forest tending was conducted. To estimate the FWLI, we used the Ovako Working Posture Analysis System (OWAS) and the Work Load Index (WLI). The OWAS is a prominent method used for analyzing musculoskeletal load in work tasks, and WLI is a prominent method used for analyzing the work intensity of workers. The PRI values analyzed for each forest tending project were 185.3 (Thinning), 150.6 (Pruning), 181.1 (Thinning for Forest Fire Prevention), and 197.0 (Thinning for Young Trees). The WLI values, calculated on the basis of the measured heart rates, were 59.5% (Thinning), 53.5% (Pruning), 56.2% (Thinning for Forest Fire Prevention), and 62.3% (Thinning for Young Trees). The FWLI was calculated using the analyzed PRI and WLI values. The FWLI values for the forest tending project were 110.2 (Thinning), 80.7 (Pruning), 102.1 (Thinning for Forest Fire Prevention), and 123.0 (Thinning for Young Trees). The FWLI developed in this study can be used to quantitatively compare the workloads of forest workers. In the future, the analyzed FWLI can be used as a basis for improving forest workers' postures and comparing workloads across different forest projects.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.102-109
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• 2023

In realizing a hydrogen society, it is important to secure the safety of the hydrogen refueling station, which is the facility where consumers can easily meet hydrogen. The hydrogen refueling station consists of compressed gas facilities that store high-pressure hydrogen, and there is a risk that the high-pressure compressed gas facility will rupture due to a fire explosion due to hydrogen leakage in the facility or the influence of surrounding fires. Accordingly, the Korea Gas Safety Corporation is making every effort to find out risk factors from the installation stage, reflect them in the design, and secure safety through legal inspection. In this study, a TNT explosion demonstration test using a protection wall was conducted to confirm the safety effect of the protection wall installed at the hydrogen refueling station, and the empirical test results were compared and verified using FLACS-CFD, a CFD program. As a result of the empirical test and CFD analysis, it was confirmed that the effect of reducing the explosion over-pressure at the rear end of the protection wall decreased from 50% to up to 90% depending on the location, but the effect decreased when it exceeded a certain distance. The results of the empirical test and computer analysis for verifying the safety of the protection wall will be used in proposals for optimizing the protection wall standards in the future.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.1-5
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• 2010

Many sorts of fatal accidents like explosion or fire caused by gas leakage have become a social issue with the increasing use of harmful chemicals in laboratories in universities and enterprise-affiliated research institutes in Korea. Importance of safety management has been emphasized and it made Act on the Establishment of Safe Laboratory Environment enacted not only to protect lives and bodies of people working in laboratories in universities and enterprise-affiliated research institutes but also to make pleasant experimental atmosphere. Safety management system has been built and periodical checkups and safety diagnosis have been implementing in universities and enterprise-affiliated research institutes to prevent such accidents. However, in spite of those actions, continuous accidents make analysis of root cause essential. This study will show results of analysis on incidents and accidents occurred in laboratories in universities and enterprise-affiliated research institutes using Root Cause Analysis Method and propose the direction of safety management.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.6-11
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• 2010

The continuous fatal accidents like explosion or fire cause huge losses of both life and property in laboratories even though safety management system has been built and periodical checkups and safety diagnosis have been implementing in universities and enterprise-affiliated research institutes since Act on the Establishment of Safe Laboratory Environment was enacted in 2005 to prevent accidents in research laboratories. Cause analysis and safety management measures to prevent recurrence of accidents are urgently needed because accidents in research laboratories occur repeatedly with similar contents. This study will show results of analysis on incidents and accidents occurred in laboratories in universities and enterprise-affiliated research institutes using Root Cause Analysis Method and propose classified map of cause investigation and improvements so as to improve safety management in research laboratories.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.20-27
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• 2011

The consequence analysis (CA) is widely using in the petrochemical plant through adoption of the process safety management (PSM) system, but it has not practical problem that the CA was not reflected effects for employee count, business interruption loss, utility usage, and etc.. In this study, to establish the practical emergency response plan and to achieve risk based management, the consequence based on the damage area and the financial loss were estimated and compared through application on facilities in the petrochemical plant. If the damage area is used, the consequence category must be determined by safety area considering simultaneously damage area, fatality area and toxic area. Also, the consequences based on the financial loss is more practical method for the case of considering process properties and circumstances.

• Korean Journal of Health Education and Promotion
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.41-56
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• 2005

Objectives: More than 80% of unintentional injury was related to risk-taking behaviors involved in child accidents. Therefore, diverse care and concerns on safety should be provided from teachers as well as parents to build child safety behaviors. The purpose of this study was to identify the effects of safety concerns from students, teachers, and parents on elementary students' safety behaviors in Korea. Methods: The 5th and 6th grade students participated in this study in 14 elementary schools in Korea and the total number of students was 1,033. The study schools were selected by the stratified cluster sampling method throughout 7 metropolitan areas in Korea. Data were collected by the self-administered survey and the questionnaires were delivered to the vice-principals of the designated schools by ground postal service and the vice-principals conducted survey data collection. The questions on students' safety concerns, teachers' safety concerns, parents' safety concerns, safety practices, safety education, and demographics were included in the survey. All survey responses were encoded into SPSS program and t-test, ANOVA, and multiple regression analysis were utilized. Results: The students taking accidents one time more per year were more than 60% and the two thirds of them recognized that their accidents were due to their risk behaviors. Parents' education on safety practices was more frequent than teachers' education; furthermore, teachers' concerns on safety behaviors were poorer than students' or parents' concerns. In terms of safety behaviors, the scores of fire and home-related safety behavior were high but the scores of traffic and bicycle, in particular, helmet wearing practice were low. Three concerns from students, parents, and teachers all were significantly related to children's safety behaviors. Conclusions: In conclusion, safety concerns from the close networks are the important indicator of child safety behaviors and, the safety training programs, therefore, for parents and teachers as well as for students need to be developed for improving children's safe behaviors.

• Korean Journal of Health Education and Promotion
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.79-93
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• 2003

Childhood injuries are the primary cause of death and disability among children aged 5 to 14. Consistent practice of learned safety behaviors can reduce the occurrence of severe injuries among children. However, safety behavior concern is low among Korean-American children specifically and American children, in general. The objective of the study is to evaluate the impact of an unintentional injury prevention curriculum, Risk Watch among Korean-American children. A quasi-experimental design with a nonequivalent control group was used for the designed of the study. Two intervention and two control Korean schools in Atlanta participated in this study. The intervention consisted of weekly lessons in traffic, bicycle, pedestrian, and fire safety. One hundred and two students completed a pre-test and a post-test. The main outcomes were safety behaviors (seat belt use or helmet use), behavioral intentions, and safety knowledge. Analysis of covariance was used for the statistical analyses. Strong intervention effects were found for increasing knowledge of all safety topics in the intervention group. Additionally, statistically significant intervention effects were detected for increasing seat belt and helmet use, as well as behavioral intentions of wearing a seat belt and wearing a helmet, among pre-kindergarten and kindergarten students. For students in grades 1 and 2, intervention effects were found for increasing helmet use. Among students in grades 3 to 8, the intervention group showed statistically significant increases for seat belt use. Limitations of the study and recommendations for modifying and supporting unintentional injury prevention programs for school children are discussed.

• Journal of Oriental Neuropsychiatry
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.403-420
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• 2023

Objectives: This study investigated the effectiveness of herbal medicine for generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) based on recent clinical studies. Methods: Studies were searched through four databases. Clinical research studies on herbal medicine treatment for GAD patients were included. The studies were analyzed according to study design, diagnostic criteria, population, and intervention. A risk of bias assessment was performed to assess the quality of the included randomized controlled trials (RCT). If the intervention applied to the treatment and control groups was the same and two or more studies were reporting the same items as outcome indicators, a meta-analysis was performed. Results: A total of 19 studies, including 12 RCTs were selected. The most common pattern identification was 'Phlegm fire disturbing upward' (痰熱上擾), and the most used herb for therapeutic purposes was 'Rhizome of Poria cocos' (茯苓). Meta-analysis results of three studies showed that there were no significant differences in effectiveness between the herbal medicine intervention and the Western medicine intervention. Meta-analysis results of five studies showed that the Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale was significantly reduced in the case of herbal medicine intervention compared to Western medicine intervention. Conclusions: The results of our study demonstrated that herbal medicine treatment for GAD is effective in alleviating anxiety symptoms and chief symptoms of GAD. However, this study has several limitations; there was a lack of placebo-controlled RCT and an absence of objective diagnostic criteria in case reports. Therefore, further well-designed clinical studies, conducted based on the results of this study, are recommended.