• Journal of Korean Medicine for Obesity Research
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.77-85
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• 2022

While the Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is gradually turning into an endemic disease, concerns about post COVID-19 conditions (Long COVID) are emerging. Obesity is a major risk factor for severe complications of COVID-19, and COVID-19 has a wide range of effects on obesity and metabolic function. This paper aims to examine the interaction between COVID-19 and obesity, the effects and mechanisms of long COVID on obesity, and the role of Korean medicine on long COVID-related obesity. Obesity may worsen with cardiometabolic damage and psychosocial insecurity during COVID-19 and long COVID-induced neuroinflammation, systemic inflammation, mitochondrial dysfunction, and hypoxia also may aggravate obesity. Korean Medicine treatments, which have been widely used to treat obesity, have the potential to improve obesity in the era of long COVID by intervening in these mechanisms.

• The Journal of Korean Academic Society of Nursing Education
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.49-60
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• 2024

Purpose: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has had significant physical and psychological impacts on registered nurses (RNs). This study aimed to identify long COVID symptoms and their associated factors specifically among RNs. Methods: This descriptive correlational study's sample comprised 189 nurses (31.57±5.98 years, 93.7% female) in Korea. Self-reported long COVID symptoms were assessed using the COVID-19 Yorkshire Rehabilitation Scale. Data were collected from December 31, 2022, to January 13, 2023, using the online survey method and were analyzed using independent t-test, Wilcoxon signed-rank test, one-way ANOVA, Pearson's correlation, and a multiple linear regression analysis with the IBM SPSS Statistics 26.0 program. Results: A total of 179 participants (94.7%) experienced one or more long COVID symptoms. The most prevalent symptoms were weakness (77.8%), fatigue (68.3%), breathlessness (67.7%), cough/throat sensitivity/voice change (50.3%), and sleep problems (50.3%). The factors related to long COVID symptoms were marital status, type of institution, working time, acute COVID-19 symptoms, and vaccination status. The quarantine period (β=.26, p<.001) and the nursing workforce after COVID-19 (β=-.17, p=.018) were significantly associated with long COVID symptoms (Adjusted R² =.33). Conclusion: Providing comprehensive recognition is necessary for the understanding of long COVID symptoms and their associated factors among nurses and could promote a long COVID symptom management education program targeted at nurses. Moreover, it could facilitate effective nursing care and education plans for long COVID patients.

• Journal of Physiology & Pathology in Korean Medicine
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• v.36 no.5
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• pp.155-162
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• 2022

Even after testing negative for COVID-19, some patients continue to struggle with a variety of symptoms such as fatigue, shortness of breath, gastrointestinal problems and neurological problems. The World Health Organization (WHO) defined long COVID (Post COVID-19 conditions) as "A disease occurs in individuals with a history of probable or confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection, usually 3 months from the onset of COVID-19 with symptoms that last for at least 2 months, that cannot be explained by an alternative diagnosis." As a possible pathological mechanism of long COVID, three hypotheses are proposed: the persistence of the infectious state due to the residual virus, the persistent inflammatory response, and the autoimmune response. The main symptoms of long COVID are shortness of breath (dyspnea), abdominal pain and dyspepsia, fatigue, cognitive problems (brain fog), anosmia and dysgeusia, and chest pain, palpitations and tachycardia. In the Chinese guidelines, COVID-19 patients were divided into mild, moderate, severe, and recovery, and prescriptions with effective therapeutic effects were summarized to encourage combined treatment of chinese and western medicine. Globally, only symptomatic therapy is recommended for long COVID, but a specific treatment has not yet been proposed. Recently, morbidity code for post COVID-19 conditions was created, and it is planned to announce guidelines for long COVID treatment and management in the first half of 2023. In line with this trend, the Korean medical community needs to make efforts to prepare treatment guidelines for patients with long COVID.

• The Journal of Korean Medicine
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• v.43 no.3
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• pp.204-210
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• 2022

Objectives: The purpose of this case study was to report the clinical improvement of Long COVID(cough, sore throat) treated with Korean herbal medicine(Hyunggaeyungyo-tang and Saengmaek-san). Methods: To assess the treatment outcomes, I used the Visual analogue scale(VAS) to evaluate sore throat degree, and Leicester Cough Questionnaire Korean version(LCQ-K). Results: After treatments, cough and sore throat were significantly improved with VAS and LCQ-K. Conclusion: The Korean herbal medicine was effective in the treatment of patient who suffers Long COVID. This study suggested the possibility of Korean herbal medicine treatment for Long COVID.

• Korean Journal of Occupational Health Nursing
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.22-30
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• 2022

Purpose: This study aimed to identify the mediating effect of Psychological stress of COVID-19 stress on the relationship between nursing work environment and turnover intention of nurses in long-term care hospitals. Methods: The participants were 176 nurses working at three long-term care hospitals in Changwon City. Data were collected from August 11 to 14, 2021, using self-report questionnaires. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA, Pearson's correlation coefficients, and hierarchical regression, using the SPSS 23.0 software. A mediation analysis was performed according to the Baron and Kenny's test, and Sobel test. Results: Turnover intention was positively correlated with Psychological stress of COVID-19 stress (r=.23, p=.002) and negatively correlated with nursing work environment (r=-.44, p<.001). Psychological stress of COVID-19 stress had a significantly negative relationship with nursing work environment (r=-.15, p=.045). Psychological stress of COVID-19 stress partially mediated the relationship between nursing work environment and turnover intention. Conclusion: The findings of this study indicate that a positive nursing work environment can help nurses reduce their Psychological stress of COVID-19 stress and turnover intention. To reduce the turnover intention among nurses' in long-term care, it is necessary to promote better work environments suitable for COVID-19 and to establish detailed strategies for reducing their physiological stress.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.173-183
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• 2022

The objective of this research is to examine the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic on stock markets in a few developing and developed countries. This study uses daily data from January 2020 to May 2021 and obtained from World Health Organization and Thomson Reuters. The secondary data was evaluated through panel econometric methodology that includes different unit root tests, and to analyze the long-run relationship between variables, panel cointegration techniques were applied. The long-run causality among variables was examined through Panel Vector Error Correction Model. The overall findings of this study suggest a long-run association exists between several cases and death with the stock returns of the GCC and other stock markets. Furthermore, the VECM model also identified a long-run causality running from COVID cases and death towards the stock rerun of both sets of stock markets. However, a subsequent Wald test yielded mixed results, indicating no short-run causality between cases and deaths and stock returns in both groups; however, in the case of GCC, several COVID-19 cases are having a causal impact on stock markets, which is notable in light of the fact that the death rate in GCC is significantly lower than in many developed and developing countries.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.239-250
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• 2022

This study examined the level of capital structure and its determinants of publicly traded companies in Malaysia before and after the COVID-19 pandemic. The data for this study was examined using Python Programming Language and time-series financial data from 2,784 quarterly observations in 2019 and 2020. The maximum debt is larger before the COVID-19 period, according to the findings. During the COVID-19 period, short-term debts and total debts have both decreased slightly. However, long-term debts have increased marginally. As a result, this research demonstrates that the capital structure has changed slightly during the COVID-19 period. The findings imply that independent of the capital structure proxies, tangibility, liquidity, and business size had an impact on capital structure in both periods. It was found that profitability had a significant impact on total debts both before and after the COVID-19 crisis. While higher-profit enterprises appear to have lesser short-term debts before the COVID-19 periods, they are also more likely to have lower long-term debts during the COVID-19 periods. Even though growing companies tend to have higher short-term debts and thus total debts during those periods, longterm debts are unaffected by potential growth.

• The Journal of Korean Physical Therapy
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• v.34 no.6
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• pp.304-311
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• 2022

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the knowledge, awareness and performance of COVID-19 infection control among physical therapists and to identify the impact factors on performance Methods: Data were collected from March 16th to March 24th in 2022 from the physical therapist's in Busan. Data analysis was conducted on 170 surveys, after excluding 27 surveys that were found to be unsuitable for data analysis. Results: When correlating the study variables, knowledge and awareness were found to have a positive, meaningful correlation with performance. Performance of COVID-19 personal infection control regression analysis showed that the working department (clinic and long-term care hospital), clinical experience, the more knowledgeable, the awareness (personal), and the more clinical experience had significant positive impacts on the performance of COVID-19 infection control. Performance of COVID-19 treatment room infection control regression analysis showed that the working department (long-term care hospital), educational experience, the awareness (treatment room) had significant positive impacts on the performance of COVID-19 infection control Conclusion: The results of this study may be used as basic data for educating physical therapist's working at the COVID-19 response department. This study suggests that physical therapist's need educational programs to improve their knowledge and awareness and performance of infection control against infectious diseases such as COVID-19. Differentiated physical therapists practice education curricula must be developed and provided after understanding the varying characteristic of physical therapist's with different levels of work experience.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.43 no.2
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• pp.81-101
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• 2021

This paper estimates the expectation-augmented Phillips curve, which explains inflation dynamics, in Korea. The phenomenon of low inflation in Korea has been going on for quite some time, in particular since 2012. During the Covid-19 crisis, due to low inflation expectations the operation of monetary policy was limited as the base rate approached the zero lower bound. The main objective of this paper is to estimate where and how tightly inflation expectations are anchored. It was found that long-term inflation expectations fell to around 1%, falling short of the inflation target, and that inflation expectations are strongly anchored to long-term expectations, which implies that the low inflation phenomenon is likely to extend into the future. The results also imply that even if inflation fluctuates due to temporary disturbances, it may converge to a level below the inflation target. The slight rebound of long-term expectations during the Covid-19 crisis suggests that the aggressive monetary policy may have contributed to improving economic agents' beliefs about the commitment of monetary authorities to inflation stability. This may also help long-term expectations gradually to approach the inflation target.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.8 no.4
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• pp.673-685
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• 2021

This study aims to determine theoretically the best workers layoff/training strategy that entrepreneurs should apply to manage the COVID-19 crisis successfully. It also examines the impacts of the Saudi government's emergency measures on firm performance. The paper develops a theoretical framework in which the optimal control technics is applied to model the entrepreneur's hiring, layoff, and training behaviors. The results show that, during the current COVID-19 pandemic, the entrepreneur should first lay off the less productive workers to reduce labor costs. As more and more inefficient workers quit and profit increases, the entrepreneur starts expanding his activity and training workers. In the long run, only the training activity allows the firm efficiency to grow at a constant rate. This finding suggests that the key to long-run economic recovery in Saudi Arabia will rely on training, innovation, and adaptability to the new digital environment. The paper also shows that the Saudi government initiative of covering 60% of salaries for the small- and medium-sized entrepreneurs during the COVID-19 pandemic will enhance training activities in small- and medium-sized enterprises and improve their efficiency in both the short and long run. This policy will also prevent Saudi entrepreneurs from laying off half of their staff.