• Archives of Plastic Surgery
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.466-470
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• 2007

Purpose: Active prevention is an essential component in reducing the development of pressure sores. For the high-risk patient group, following the certified pressure sore screening scale as well as educating the patient and the nurses who care for them can lead to optimal management of these patients. Applying a risk assessment scale along with a prevention strategy can reduce medical costs and length of stays at the hospital. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the efficacy of a new pressure sore risk assessment scale based on the universally recommended Braden scale and our prevention program. Methods: From June to August, 2003, our pressure ulcer risk assessment scale was applied to a total of 1882 patients admitted to the experimental group (intensive care unit, neurosurgery, general surgery, and oncology units). It was based on Braden scale. We analysed sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive value and ROC curve to evaluate its efficacy. Pressure ulcer prevention program was composed of patient's education using protocol and specific nursing care. The incidence of pressure ulcers was also measured during the 3 months period, and those were compared to the control group of 1789 patients from March to May, 2002. Results: 118(6.27%) of the experimental group were high-risk with an incidence of pressure ulcers measuring 4 (0.21%). Sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive value of our scale were 100%, 94%, 4%, 100%, respectively, and AUC(area under the curve) was 0.992. In the control group, the incidence of pressure ulcers was 11(0.61%). Statistical analyses using chisquared tests with a significance level of 5%, the results were such that ${\chi }^2=3.6482$(p=0.0561). The results proved to be statistically significant in borderline. Conclusion: The results from this study proved that pressure sore risk assessment scale based on Braden scale has an excellent efficacy, and shows that our pressure ulcer prevention program is partially effective in reducing pressure ulcer incidence.

• Neonatal Medicine
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.345-352
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• 2011

Purpose: Nursing quality influences patient' outcomes in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). We compared differences in adverse events (AEs) by differences in the level of nursing experience at the NICU, developed guidelines to prevent AE, and then investigated the change in AE. Methods: AEs related to nursing were investigated from January 1, 2009 to December 31 2009 at the NICU of the newly established A hospital and B hospital that has been operating for 14 years. We also assessed the level of nursing experience. Guidelines to prevent nursing-related AEs were prepared at A hospital, and the change in the incidence of AE was investigated after 1 year. Results: Twenty nurses (80%) had <2 years experience at A hospital, whereas 13 nurses (65%) had 2 years or longer but less than 4 years experience at B hospital (P<0.001). The number of incidences of AE that occurred in 2009 in A hospital was higher (46) than that at B hospital (10). Intravenous (IV) injection-related incidents had the highest share in both hospitals: 24 incidents (52.2%) at hospital A and eight incidents (80%) at hospital B. After the guidelines were instituted in 2009, the number of nursing AEs decreased to 17, of which the number of IV incidents was the highest (6, 35%), athough its share decreased. Conclusion: Supervision and prevention guidelines should be in place to reduce nursing AEs, which would improve the quality of NICU service.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.86-97
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• 1978

The mobile medical service has been operated for many years by a number of medical schools and hospitals as a most convenient means of medical service delivery to the people residing in such area where the geographical and socioeconomic conditions are not good enough to enjoy modern medical care. Despite of official appraisal showing off simply with numbers of outpatients treated and medical persons participated, however, as well recognized, the capability (in respect of budget, equipment and time) of those mobile medical teams is so limitted that it often discourages the recipients as well as medical participants themselves. In the midst of rising need to secure medical service of good quality to all parts of the country, and of developing concept of primary health care system, authors evaluated the effectiveness of and problems associated with mobile medical servies program through the community diagnosis of a village (Opo-myun, Kwangju-gun) to obtain the information which may be halpful for future improvement. 1. Owing to the nationwide Sae-Maul movement powerfully practiced during last several years, living environment of farm villages generally and remarkably improved including houses, water supply and wastes disposal etc. Neverthless, due to limitations in budget time and lack of knowledge (probably the most important), these improvements tend to keep up appearances only and are far from the goal which may being practical benefit in promoting the health of the community. 2. As a result of intensive population policy led by the government since 1962, there has been considerable advances in understanding and the rate of practicing family planning through out the villages and yet, one should see many things, especially education, to be done. Fifty eight per cent of mothers have not received prenatal check and the care for most (72%) delivery was offered by laymen at home. 3. Approximately seven per cent of the population was reported to have chronic illness but since only a few (practically none) of the people has had physical check up by doctors, the actual prevalence of chronic diseases may reach many times of the reported. The same fact was observed also in prevalence of tuberculosis; the patients registered at local health center totaled 31 comprising only 0.51% while the numbers in two neighboring villages (designated as demonstration area of tuberculosis control and mass examination was done recently) were 3.5 and 4.0% respectively. Prevalence rate of all dieseses and injuries expereinced during one month (July, 1977) was 15.8%. Only one tenth of those patients received treatment by physicians and one fifth was not treated at all. The situation was worse as for the chronic patients; 84% of all cases either have never been treated or discontinued therapy, and the main reasons were known to be financial difficulty and ignorance or indifference. 4. Among the patients treated by our mobile clinic, one third was chronic cases and 45% of all patients, by the opinion of doctors attended, were those who may be treated by specially trained nurses or other paramedics (objects of primary care). Besides, 20% of the cases required professional managements of level beyond the mobile team's capability and in this sense one may conclude that the effectiveness (performance) of present mobile medical team is quite limitted. According to above findings, the authors would like to suggest following for mobile medical service and overall medicare program for the people living in remote country side. 1. Establishment of primary health care system secured with effective communication and evacuation (between villages and local medical center) measures. 2. Nationwide enforcement of medical insurance system. 3. Simple outpatient care which now constitutes the main part of the most mobile medical services should largely be yielded up to primary health care unit of the village and the mobile team itself should be assigned on new and more urgent missions such as mass screening health examination of the villagers, health education with modern and effective audiovisual aids, professional training and consultant services for the primary health care organization.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.49 no.5
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• pp.624-632
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• 2000

Background : Home ventilation can decrease hospital-acquired infection, increase physical activity, improve nutritional status, enhance quality of life, and reduce medical costs. The number of patient using home ventilators has been increasing, particularly in Europe and United States. Although the number of patients with home ventilation has been increasing in Korea, the current status of these patients is not well known. This study was undertaken to obtain basic information upon these patients in addition to evaluating any problems related to patients' home care in our country. Methods : A register of 92 patients with home ventilators in Seoul and Kyunggi Province were obtained from commercial ventilator supply companies. The patients were contacted by phone and 29 of them accepted our visit. Information concerning education about home care before discharge, equipment cost, and problems related to home care were documented. The mode and preset variables of the home ventilator were checked; tidal volume (TV), peak airway pressure, and oxygen saturation were measured. Results : There were 26 males (90%) and their mean age was 48.0 (${\pm}20.1$) years. The underlying diseases were : 21 neuromuscular disorders, 2 spinal cord injuries, 6 chronic lung diseases. Among the caregivers, spouses (n=14) predominated. Education for home care before discharge was performed primarily by intensive care unit nurses and the education for ventilator management by commercial companies. Twenty-five of the 29 patients had tracheostomies. Volume targeted type (VTT ; n=20, 69%) was more frequently used than the pressure targeted type (PTT). Twenty-three of the 29 patients purchased a ventilator privately, which cost 7,450,000 (${\pm}$3,290,000) won for a PTT, and 14,280.000 (${\pm}$3,130,000) won for a VTT. Total cost for the equipment was 11,430,000 (${\pm}$634,000) won. The average cost required for home care per month was 1,120,000 (${\pm}$1,360, 000) won. Conclusion : The commonest underlying disease of the patients was neuromuscular disease. The VTT ventilator was primarily used with tracheostomy. Patients and their families considered the financial difficulties associated with purchasing and maintaining equipment for home care an urgent problem. Some patients were aided by a visiting nurse, however most patients were neglected and left without professional medical supervision.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.1650-1662
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• 2014

This study aimed to develop smartphone application contents for the medication reconciliation of high-alert medications and to evaluate the satisfaction for this application. The xcode 4.5 and ios 6.1 SDK(software development kit) were used for constructing screen of the system. After implementation during 4 weeks, thirty five ICU(Intensive Care Unit) nurses were asked function related, contents related, and usage related satisfaction using 12 items. And differences of satisfaction according to the number of daily use and the frequency of use were evaluated. Data were analyzed using descriptive analysis, ANOVA with the SPSS 18.0. We developed the formula for drug dosage calculation, the alarming procedure, and the information of the high alert medication. In the satisfaction items, the mean score of 'This application is helpful to perform drug dosage calculation' was 3.14. However, 'I satisfy this application' was relatively low as 2.94. There were no differences in satisfaction according to the daily use and frequency of use. Based on the results of this study, more advanced smartphone application for medication reconciliation of high-alert medications will provide an important platform for patient safety.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.929-939
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• 1999

The purpose of this study was to identify knowledge of universal precautions and its performance in practice. The research was conducted from November 2 to 30, 1998. A total 515 student nurses ; 249 from a baccalaureate nursing college and 266 from second and third year of a 3-year community nursing college were surveyed. The results are as following : 1. The average score for universal precautions knowledge was 270.41$\pm$19.43/300(range 150-300). The results showed that 99.2% of students avoid injury from used needles, 98.6% answered that they always wash their hands if they had contact with the patient's blood and they always dispose of used needles in special collectors (97.7%) for needles. But, 39.2% responsed that they dispose of used needles after recapping them. 2. The average score for universal precautions knowledge of the senior students in the 4-year college was the highest (277.65$\pm$13.99). 3. The average score for the performance of universal precautions knowledge was 53.18 $\pm$5.91(range 14-70). The items : ‘I cautiously avoid injury from the used needles’(4.92$\pm$0.33), ‘I always wash my hands if there has been contact with the patient's blood’(4.91$\pm$0.34), and ‘I always disposed of used needles in the appropriate collector’(4.89$\pm$0.42) showed the highest performance. However ‘I always dispose of used needles after recapping them’(2.19$\pm$1.39) and ‘I always use protection goggles when in danger of contamination’(2.19$\pm$1.20) showed low performance level. 4. The highest average score for universal precautions performance was shown among the second year students in 3-year nursing college (54.19$\pm$6.92) between the groups. It showed that the level of the universal precautions performance was higher for those who had education on university precautions prior to performance of the universal precautions than for those without any prior education. 5. The percentage of students who reported the experience of direct contact with patients' blood and/or body fluids was 42.30%. The experience of direct contact with blood and/or body fluids of the educational group was significantly higher than those were not educated. 6. The most frequent cause of the direct contact was ‘needle pricking and/or skin cut’(63.04%). The most frequent substance with which the students contact was ‘blood’(59.85%). The majority of the sample had answered that the mode of contamination was ‘unknown’(63.54%). The majority of the sample answered that strategies used after contamination included ‘washing with soap’(33.61%). Reviewing the chart of patients or asking other health professionals(28.85%). 7. The number of students who had the experience of a needle stick and/or skin cut was 145(28.16%). The clinical practice places where the incidents occurred were mainly in the internal medicine unit (45.07%) and the surgical unit (31.92%) followed by the intensive care unit and the emergency unit in order. The experience of a needle stick and/or skin cut happened during on intra-muscular injection 47.34% and intravenous injection 21.81%. The causes of the needle stick and/or skin cut were ‘putting the needle cap back on 77(35.81%)’. The number of students who took an appropriate post management blood test and/or vaccination was 27(18.62%). 8. The Pearson Correlation Coefficient between the knowledge of universal precautions and performance of universal precautions in practice showed a positive correlation.

• Neonatal Medicine
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.245-249
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• 2010

Purpose: Numerous false alarms by pulse oximetry, which is widely used in neonatal intensive care unit, can delay response to true alarms. Masimo $SET^{(R)}$ was introduced lately, to overcome false alarms by motion. We compared the clinical performance of two devices (Nellcor $N-595^{(R)}$ and Masimo $SET^{(R)}$) for the evaluation of the false alarm frequency during usual motion artifacts and stable state. Methods: A total of 20 preterm infants weighing 1,000-2,500 g were enrolled in the study. The sensors of two devices were placed on the different feet on the same infants, and both devices were programmed to emit an alarm for episode of hypoxemia (SpO2$\leq$85%). The false alarms were defined as episodes of poor correlation with ECG heart rate, poor waveforms, and the absence of obvious signs of hypoxia. We compared the frequency of false alarms between the two devices. Results: The mean chronological age was 20.8 days and the mean body weight was 1,668 g on the study day. The frequency of total false alarm was significantly fewer for Masimo $SET^{(R)}$ pulse oximetry (48 in Nellcor $N-595^{(R)}$, 27 in Masimo $SET^{(R)}$) although the false alarm during usual motion artifacts was not significantly between two devices (32 in Nellcor $N-595^{(R)}$, 19 in Masimo $SET^{(R)}$). Conclusion: The Masimo $SET^{(R)}$ pulse oximetry has fewer false alarm rates and identified more true hypoxic events than Nellcor $N-595^{(R)}$ pulse oximetry. Therefore, it is useful for adequate oxygen therapy and helps to decrease unnecessary handling by clinicians and nurses.