• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.1149-1155
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• 2016

Background: Examination of sentinel lymph node (SLN) biopsies provides accurate nodal staging for breast cancer and plays a key role in patient management. Procurement of SLNs and the methods used to process specimens are equally important. Increasing the level of detail in histopathological examination of SLNs increases detection of metastatic tumours but will also increase the burden of busy laboratories and thus may not be carried out routinely. Recommendation of a reasonable standard in SLN examination is required to ensure high sensitivity of results while maintaining a manageable practice workload. Materials and Methods: Twenty-four patients with clinically node-negative breast cancer were recruited. Combined radiotracer and blue dye methods were used for identification of SLNs. The nodes were thinly sliced and embedded. Serial sectioning and immunohistochemical (IHC) staining against AE1/AE3 were performed if initial H&E sections of the blocks were negative. Results: SLNs were successfully identified in all patients. Ten cases had nodal metastases with 7 detected in SLNs and 3 detected only in axillary nodes (false negative rate, FNR=30%). Some 5 out of 7 metastatic lesions in the SLNs (71.4%) were detected in initial sections of the thinly sliced tissue. Serial sectioning detected the remaining two cases with either micrometastases or isolated tumour cells (ITC). Conclusions: Thin slicing of tissue to 3-5mm thickness and serial sectioning improved the detection of micro and macro-metastases but the additional burden of serial sectioning gave low yield of micrometastases or ITC and may not be cost effective. IHC validation did not further increase sensitivity of detection. Therefore its use should only be limited to confirmation of suspicious lesions. False negative cases where SLNs were not involved could be due to skipped metastases to non-sentinel nodes or poor technique during procurement, resulting in missed detection of actual SLNs.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Laryngology, Phoniatrics and Logopedics
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.11-15
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• 2007

Background and Objectives: $VoCoM^{(R)}$ is a set composed of prefabricated hydroxylapatite implants and shims of various sizes that are designed for the type I thyroplasty, Authors aimed to evaluate the efficacy of $VoCoM^{(R)}$ System in type I thyroplasty. Materials and Method: Twenty three patients with unilateral vocal cord palsy were included in the study, who received type I thyroplasty with $VoCoM^{(R)}$ between May 2000 and May 2007 in St. Mary's Hospital, The Catholic University of Korea, Seoul, Korea, Acoustic, aerodynamic and stroboscopic analyses were performed pre-and post-operatively, Subjective voice improvement was analysed by Voice handicap index, Results : Preoperative jitter was $4.68{\pm}2.46%$ and improved to $3.19{\pm}1.94%$(P<0,05), Preoperative NHR was $0.26{\pm}0.1$ and improved to $0.18{\pm}0,07$(P<0.05), Preoperative MPT was $6.16{\pm}4.9$secs improved to $9.55{\pm}4.67$secs(p<0.05), The postoperative stroboscopy revealed an effective medialization of vocal fold of all patients, Conclusion: Type I thyroplasty using $VoCoM^{(R)}$ is a efficient, safe and convenient way of vocal fold medialization at the expense of its high cost and difficulty in removal.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.127-132
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• 2021

The intravenous injection monitoring system used by medical institutions was developed to remotely provide patients with the amount of intravenous injected and the termination point of the injection. In order to measure the amount of intravenous injection input, the weight or flow rate of the level going out from the inside to outside of the intravenous injection can be observed with a measuring sensor. The criteria for devices that apply herein are accuracy and vigilance. In addition, it is compact and should be easy to use when installing intravenous injection on patients. In medical institutions, the accuracy of the measured values must be high, and economically inexpensive devices are required. In this study, low-cost small-weight-centered load cell sensors were applied, and algorithms were applied to reduce the artefact by external movement by converging with gyro sensors for accuracy of measurements. As a result, it was possible to reduce the error of measurement, thereby improving the accuracy of the intravenous injection monitoring measurement value.

• Journal of Home Health Care Nursing
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.58-72
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• 2000

This study was an attempt to encourage the development of a rehabilitation delivery system and programs as a substitute service for hospitalization on the case of car accident patients, such as hospital based home health care nursing services. Various substitute services for hospitalization are required to curtail the length of stay for inpatients who were hospitalized with car accident compensation insurance. It focused on developing an estimation an early discharge day for car accident inpatients based on detailed statements of treatment for 111 inpatients who were hospitalized at the General Hospital in 1997. This study had four specific purposes as follows. First. to find out the utilization of medical services. Second, to estimate the time of early discharge and income increasing effect based on early discharge for those patients. Third, to identify the factors affecting total medical expenditure and the length of stay for those inpatients. Forth, to figure out the need of utilizing home health care nursing service for accident patients. In order to analyze the length of stay and medical expenditure for inpatients who were hospitalized due to car accidents, the authors conducted micro- and macro-analysis of medical and medical expenditure records. Micro-analysis was done by nominal group discussion of 4 expertise with the critical criteria, such as a decrease in the amount of treatment after surgery, treatments, tests, drugs and changes in the test consistency, drug methods, vital signs, start of ROM exercise, doctor's order, patient's outside visiting ability, and stable conditions. In addition to identifying variables affecting medical expenditure, and the length of stay and income effect due to early discharge day, the data was analyzed with a multiple regression analysis and linear regression analysis model by SPSS-PC for windows and Excell program. Results of this study were as follows. First. the mean length of stay was 50.3 days. whereas the mean length of stay due to early discharge was 34.3 days at the hospital. The estimation of time of early discharge depended on the length of stay. The longer the length of stay, the longer the length of time of early discharge : for instance a length of stay under 10 days was estimated as correlating to a mean length of stay of 6.6 days and early discharge of 6.5. The mean length of stay was 217.4 days and the time of early discharge was 110.1 respectively. The mean medical expenditure per day was found to be 169.085 Won and the mean medical expenditure per day showed negative linear trends according to the length of stay at the hospital. The estimation results of the income effect due to being discharged 16 days early was around 2,244,000 won per bed. However. this sum does not represent the real benefits resulting from early discharge, but rather the income increasing amount without considering medical prime cost in the general hospital. Therefore, further analysis is required on the cost containments and benefits as turn over rate per bed as the medical prime costs. The length of stay was most significant and was positive to the total medical expenditure, as expected. Surgery and patient's residential area was also an important variable in explaining medical expenditure. The level of complications was the most significant variable in explaining the length of stay. There was a high level for need a home health care nursing service which further supports early discharge for accident patients. In addition, when the patient was discharged. they needed follow up care for complications suffered during the car accident. $86.8\%$ of discharged patients responded that they needed home health services after early discharge. From these research findings, the following suggestions have been drawn. Strategies on a health care delivery system must be developed in order to focus on the consumer's needs and being planned for 21 century health policy in Korea. Community based intermediate facilities or home health care should be developed for rehabilitation services as a substitute for hospitalization in order to shorten the length of stay would be. A hospital based home health care nursing service. it would be available immediately to utilize by patients who want rehabilitation services as a substitute for hospitalization with the cooperation of car insurance companies.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.2167-2172
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• 2013

Lung cancer remains a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, accounting for more deaths than any other cause. All the clinical practice guidelines recommended against routine screening for lung cancer have cited lack of robust evidence, at least until a few years back. However, the potential to screen lung cancers has received renewed interest due to superior performance of low dose CT (LD-CT) in detecting early stage cancers. The incremental costs and risks involved due to the invasive procedures in the screened population due to a high false positivity rate questions the use of LD-CT scan as a reliable community based screening tool. There is therefore an urgent need to find a less invasive and a more reliable biomarker that is crucial to increase the probability of early lung cancer detection. This can truly make a difference in lung cancer survival and at the same time be more cost and resource utilization effective. Sampling blood serum being minimally invasive, low risk and providing an easy to obtain biofluid, needs to be explored for potential biomarkers. This review discusses the use of circulatory miRNAs that have been able to discriminate lung cancer patients from disease free controls. Several studies conducted recently suggest that circulating miRNAs may have promising future applications for screening and early detection of lung cancer.

• Journal of Korean Neurosurgical Society
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• v.61 no.2
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• pp.167-179
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• 2018

The prevalence of patients with adult spinal deformity (ASD) has been reported as high as 68%. ASD often leads to significant pain and disability. Recent emphasis has been placed on sagittal plane balance and restoring normal sagittal alignment with regards to the three dimensional deformity of ASD. Optimal sagittal alignment has been known to increase spinal biomechanical efficiency, reduce energy expenditure by maintaining a stable posture with improved load absorption, influence better bony union, and help to decelerate adjacent segment deterioration. Increasingly positive sagittal imbalance has been shown to correlate with poor functional outcome and poor self-image along with poor psychological function. Compensatory mechanisms attempt to maintain sagittal balance through pelvic rotation, alterations in lumbar lordosis as well as knee and ankle flexion at the cost of increased energy expenditure. Restoring normal spinopelvic alignment is paramount to the treatment of complex spinal deformity with sagittal imbalance. Posterior osteotomies including posterior column osteotomies, pedicle subtraction osteotomies, and posterior vertebral column resection, as well anterior column support are well known to improve sagittal alignment. Understanding of whole spinal alignment and dynamics of spinopelvic alignment is essential to restore sagittal balance while minimizing the risk of developing sagittal decompensation after surgical intervention.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.344-354
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• 2002

This study is a fact-finding research to understand the status of visiting nursing services operated by health centers in Korea and it aims to provide basic information for policy development on operation and management of visiting nursing services in health centers. Method: This study investigates the results of visiting nursing services in 242 health centers from Jan. 10 through Dec. 30, 2000, where 3,106 visiting nurses were employed by the public work program. Result: In 2000, 129,401 new household as service recipients was identified and that was 0.9% of Koreas total households (15,137,000), and 5.8% of low income households (2,242,000). The highest high risk group was dementia patients(aver. 55.2/1,000 person). Average number of households visited by visiting nurse were 4.5 households per day and the first-visited houses per visiting nurse were 1.1 households per day. The re-visiting rate was 71.3%. Total 4,059,130 service items were provided and assessment ranked the highest with 33.7%. The satisfaction level of clients on the nurses was an average of 3.17 points in the scale of 4 and the nursing service was a 2.60 points in a scale of 3. Conclusion: Visiting nursing service should continue to provide comprehensive healthcare services in cost-effective ways while cooperating with others

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.237-243
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• 2004

In recent, many cardiac centers have preferred off-pump coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) to on-pump CABG to prevent the adverse effects of cardiopulmonary bypass. The present study was performed to prove beneficial effects of off-pump CABG. Sixty adult patients scheduled for elective CABG were randomly assigned to On-pump group (n=30) or Off-pump group (n=30). Arterial blood samples were drawn before and after the operation (Pre-OP and Post-OP, respectively) for measuring CBC, prothrombin time, activated thromboplastine time, blood gas analysis, creatine kinase-MB (CK-MB) level, and lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) level. Perioperative parameters including heparin and protamine usages, complications, blood components usages, blood loss, ventilation and ICU-staying time, and hospitalization were also evaluated. Platelet count at Post-OP was high in Off-pump group whereas CK-MB and LDH levels were low compared with On-pump group. Off-pump group had significantly lower heparin and protamine usages, lower total leukocyte count, higher hematocrit and hemoglobin levels, less blood loss, lower usages of blood components, shorter ventilation and ICU-staying time, and lower incidence of pleural effusion than On-pump group. Other variables did not significantly differ between two groups. These results showed that Off-pump CABG was a satisfactory technique with less inflammatory reaction, less cardiac damage, less postoperative complications, and less cost.

• Archives of Plastic Surgery
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.421-427
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• 2005

Although the incidence of mediastinal wound infection in patient undergoing median sternotomy for cardiovascular surgery is relatively low(less than 1%), it is not only a devastating and potentially life-threatening complication but also associated morbidity, mortality and cost are unacceptably high. During the past few decades various methods had been applied for the treatment of postoperative mediastinitis. Currently, chest wall reconstruction by using muscle flaps-especially pectoralis major muscle and rectus abdominis muscle are commonly selected for the reconstruction after wide debridement has become widely accepted. We performed bilateral pectoralis major-rectus abdominis muscles in-continuity bipedicle flap to overcome the limit of each flap for reconstruction of sternal defects in 17 patients. We analyzed the results of the surgery. Recurrent infection developed in 17.6% of cases and abdominal herniation was observed in one patient. There was no postoperative hematoma or death. We conclude that this flap is very valuable in reconstruction of the anterior chest wall defect caused by post-sternotomy infection because it provides sufficient volume to fill the entire mediastinum, and the complication rate compares favorably to that of other methods.

• Journal of Korean Physical Therapy Science
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.415-425
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• 2000

It is well known that the lifetime incidence of low back pain is extraordinarily high, but those who incur the majority of the cost, both personally and financially, are the chronic pain. Stabilization programmers attracted our interest, with their aims of using the muscle system to protect spinal joint structures from further repetitive microtrauma, recurrent pain and degerative change. In overviewing the stabilizing role of the trunk and back mucles our attention became focused on muscles which controlled the lumbar and lumbosacral joints rather than on muscles which span the spine from the thorax to pelvis. It was considered that muscles such as the lumbar multifidus, transversus abdominis, and possibly also parts of the obliquus internus abdominis, would most likely function to stabilize the segments of the lumbar spine. In order to check if these muscles were functioning in low back pain patients, it was necessary to devise specific muscle tests. The new concept involves exercises using only relatively low activity levels in the muscles. More emphasis is placed on a motor skill which has to be relearned, practised and then gradully incorporated back into functional movement.