• Journal of Information Technology Applications and Management
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.31-48
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• 2014

The concept of Health Related Quality of Life and its determinants have evolved since the 1980s. Although many researchers have published articles of technology usage in hospitals and the installation of technology based healthcare system, the research about applying the information technology to improve the patients' perceived quality of healthcare services is still limited. In general, services are deeds, processes and performances that are essentially concerns of the consumer. The healthcare service quality depends on tangible factors, such as equipments, facilities, and the quality of hospital staff and also the intangible ones. The main purpose of this work is to establish new model and find out the contribution of information technology to enhance the patients' perceived quality of healthcare service. We attempted to examine the main information technology related factors in 3 aspects, namely quality of information, the technology accessibility and the community that can improve patients' perceived quality of healthcare services. Offline and online questionnaires were used to measure the patients' perceived quality and were distributed to 384 people in 2 countries, Laos and South Korea. A principle component analysis and multiple regressions were used to verify our model. Results show that the use of information technology has partial positive effect on patient-physician interaction in both countries. However, patient knowledge and patient autonomy which are the 2 dimensions of patient-physician interaction has significant positive effect on patients' perceived quality of healthcare service.

• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.22 no.5
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• pp.607-616
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• 2020

Health care wearables are devices that are attached to or combined with the human body to improve the health care capabilities of the human body that can be safely and adjustable according to preference. This study provided direction for future research on healthcare wearables in the field of clothing science, considering trends observed in this field from 2010 to 2019. Over the last 10 years, 812 studies have been conducted on healthcare wearables in Korea. Research has increased significantly since 2015, with a large number of articles published in this field. The research for this study was broken down into the following categories: technology development, marketing analysis, and technology analysis. The results according to the research method demonstrated that development and production methods were used most frequently, followed by trend analysis, experiment and evaluation, and survey. An analysis of keywords in the articles studied revealed that device, healthcare, big data (biometric data and database), and healthcare convergence technologies were trending. Similarly, detailed research on healthcare wearable devices and related technologies was actively being conducted. However, focusing on fiber, textiles, design, and clothing articles, in relation to the field of clothing in healthcare wearables, only 81 articles were found on this topic (10.0%), which was low compared to other studies. Therefore, it was determined that more research on healthcare wearables is necessary in the field of clothing.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.245-246
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• 2022

Concerns about a global economic recession are rising following the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Accordingly, government entities, which are committed to overcome two barriers to severe inflation and economic recession, are showing high interest in spending management so as not to undermine fiscal soundness. Since the health care sector especially accounts for a large proportion of fiscal expenditure, it should be managed in a manner that the expense is appropriately spent. The National Health Insurance System and Healthcare System have secured international competitiveness and reliability by effectively responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. Likewise, considerable efforts should be made to reorganize the welfare and healthcare systems so that they can be sustainable during the post-COVID-19 era and the recession.

• Quality Improvement in Health Care
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.14-34
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• 2013

Objectives: The purpose of this study is to provide comprehensive information of qualification systems of developed countries needed to establish our national system for QI(Quality improvement) specialists. Methods: All articles related to any applicable domestic or foreign countries' laws, operational status, and detailed programs for professional qualification system of QI were reviewed. Result: In the United States, a non-profit organization, Healthcare Quality Certification Commission (HQCC) has set the policies, procedures and standards in the field of health care quality. And qualification system of CPHQ (certified professional in healthcare quality) has been operated in order to authenticate the qualifications in the field of quality management. IBQH(international Board for quality in healthcare), a qualification system of experts in the United Kingdom, was designed to assist the qualification of professionals to improve the quality of healthcare. In addition, Health Research Center of Feinberg School of Medicine in Northwestern University has been operating Master's and doctoral degree programs in the field of the quality of care and patient safety and IHI (institute for healthcare improvement) open school was operating a professional training course related to the quality of care and patient safety. Conclusion: Quantity and complexity of information of the quality of care and patient safety have been increased. For reform of the health care system, a special training course of the expertise and leadership are needed. So far, there is no national professional certification courses in our nation. Therefore essential job skill should be acquired individually. For systematic and effective quality improvement activities, the educational and certification system with professional development model are needed.

• Journal of Digital Contents Society
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.981-993
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• 2018

Smart healthcare is convergence of ICT and healthcare services, and interdisciplinary research has been actively conducted in various fields. The objective of this study is to investigate trends of smart healthcare research using topic modeling and ego network analysis. Text analysis, frequency analysis, topic modeling, word cloud, and ego network analysis were conducted for the abstracts of 2,690 articles in Scopus from 2001 to April 2018. Topic Modeling analysis resulted in eight topics, Topics included "AI in healthcare", "Smart hospital", "Healthcare platform", "Blockchain in healthcare", "Smart health data", "Mobile healthcare", " Wellness care", "Cognitive healthcare". In order to examine the topic modeling results core deeply, we analyzed word cloud and ego network analysis for eight topics. This study aims to identify trends in smart healthcare research and suggest implications for establishing future research direction.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.146-159
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• 2019

Background: The purpose of this study is to measure the Korean health literacy level and to analyse its gaps according to the factors of socioeconomic and health status and health behaviors. Based on this, policy implications were reviewed to improve the understandability on health information and to reduce the gap among socioeconomic groups. Methods: HLS-EU-Q47, a tool developed by the European Health Literacy Project, was used to conduct a face-to-face interview survey on the health literacy for the samples from general population. Results: The public general health literacy (HL) index was 34.5 out of 50. HL is consisted of three sub-dimensions: healthcare (HC-HL), disease prevention (DP-HL), and health promotion (HP-HL). And a HL analysis found scores of 34.7 points for HC-HL, 35.4 points for DP-HL, and 33.3 points for HP-HL. The level of all HL was different according to socioeconomic characteristics and health behavior. Conclusion: Based on the results of this study, more research activities on health-related literacy need to be conducted, and monitoring system on the HL level needs to be developed and implemented. In addition, a program to improve HL levels needs to be developed in order to strengthen the basis for a more sustainable healthcare system as an agenda with national health policy priority.

• Korean Institute of Interior Design Journal
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.83-91
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• 2016

This study is a basic research to suggest user-centered healthcare environmental color, which aims to analyze tendency of color consciousness and preference depending on the user characteristics (generation, gender, residential area, and environment). For this purpose, this study constructed an analysis tool through the literature review with regard to environmental color of healthcare facility and influential factors of color preference. Besides, an online survey regarding general usage and satisfaction, health related color consciousness, and color preference tendency of healthcare facility was conducted targeting from 20s to 60s, total 1,500 persons. The results of this study are as follows: (1) The usage and satisfaction of healthcare facilities were higher for older generation and accessible urban area. (2) The respondents were aware that color and health are related, recognizing 'green' as healthy and stress relieving color. Besides, 'natural' and 'clear' was the highest in health related color image. 'Light' which relates to vitality was high as well for older generation. (3) In the color preference tendency survey, hue PB was generally the most highly preferred, in details, younger generation preferred B and R while older generation preferred G. The survey also showed high value and chroma were preferred, while female and younger generation preferred high value of 9.0 and low chroma close to achromatic color, which presented older generation preferred vivid color.

• IE interfaces
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.177-185
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• 2007

e-Business in healthcare sector has been called e-Health, which is evolving into u-Health with advances of ubiquitous technologies. Seamless information sharing among health organizations is being discussed in many nations including USA, UK, Australia and Korea. Efforts for establishing the electronic health record (EHR) system and a nation-wide information sharing environment are called NHII (National Health Information Infrastructure) initiatives. With the advent of u-Health and progress of health information systems, information security issues in healthcare sector have become a very significant problem. In this paper, we analyze several issues on health information security occurring in u-Health environment and develop an information security standard for protecting health information. It is expected that the standard proposed in this work could be established as a national standard after sufficient reviews by information security experts, stakeholders in healthcare sector, and health professionals. Health organizations can establish comprehensive information security systems and protect health information more effectively using the standard. The result of this paper also contributes to relieving worries about privacy and security of individually identifiable health information brought by NHII implementation and u-Health systems.

• Journal of Korean Public Health Nursing
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.456-469
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• 2016

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the awareness of Korean unification and health care in healthcare professional students. Methods: Descriptive survey design was used, and self administered questionnaires were collected from 567 participants. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, chi-square test, ANOVA, and scheffe test. Results: A total of 279(54.4%) students answered that Korean unification is needed. The mean score of attentiveness to Korean unification was 5.27(${\pm}2.10$) out of 10, and the mean score of interest on health care for unification was 4.28(${\pm}2.26$). The degree of interest in Korean unification was significantly associated with the degree of health care for unification(p<.001). The mean score of necessity regarding health care education for unification was 5.59(${\pm}2.15$) out of 10, which was proportional to the degree of interest in the Korean unification(p<.001). The mean score of knowledge regarding North Korea's medical status was 2.35(${\pm}1.17$) out of 10. Conclusion: Based on the study results, continuous education about unification as well as health care for unification is required in order to increase awareness of Korean unification and healthcare in students. Furthermore, additional studies to better understand nursing care systems of North Korea and to identify the roles of nurses in the unification process and public healthcare of unified Korea are needed.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.312-327
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• 2021

Background: Infection prevention and control (IPC) to manage healthcare-associated infection (HCAI) has emerged as one of the most significant public health issues in Korea. The purpose of this study is to draw implications in IPC policies by analyzing the context, process, and major actors in policy development and comparatively analyzing IPC policy contents of Korea with three other countries. Additionally, IPC policies were analyzed in the context of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) to provide implications for future pandemics and HCAI events. Methods: This study incorporates a qualitative approach based on document and content analysis, applying codes and thematic categorization. IPC policy contents are comparatively analyzed by adopting the concept model, developed by the World Health Organization, which consists of core components of IPC structure at the national and facility level. Results: National IPC policies were developed within a complex social and political context, through the involvement of various stakeholders. IPC policies in Korea place a high emphasis on establishing IPC programs and built environments in healthcare facilities, whereas there were potentials for improvement in policies involving patients and promoting a safety culture. IPC policies, which currently focus on general hospitals and certain functions of hospitals, should further be expanded to target all healthcare facilities and functions, to ensure more efficient and sustainable IPC responses in the current and future disease outbreaks. Conclusion: IPC is a complex policy arena and lessons learned from the analysis of existing policies in the context of COVID-19 should provide valuable strategic implications for future policies.