• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• 제54권10호
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• pp.3833-3840
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• 2022

A method for calibrating the energy scale and detection efficiency of stilbene scintillators is presented herein. This method can be used to quantitatively analyze the Compton continuum of gamma-ray spectra obtained using such scintillators. First, channel-energy calibration was conducted by fitting a semi-empirical equation for the Compton continuum to the acquired energy spectrum and a new method to evaluate the intrinsic detection efficiency, called intrinsic Compton efficiency, of stilbene scintillators was proposed. The validity of this method was verified by changing experimental conditions such as the number of sources being measured simultaneously and the detector-source distance. According to the energy calibration, the standard error for the estimated Compton edge position was ±1.56 keV. The comparison of the intrinsic Compton efficiencies calculated from the single- and two-source spectra showed that the mean absolute difference and the mean absolute percentage difference are 0.031 %p and 0.557%, respectively, demonstrating reasonable accuracy of this method. The feasibility of the method was confirmed for an energy range of 0.5-1.5 MeV, showing that stilbene scintillators can be used to quantitatively analyze gamma rays in mixed-radiation fields.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• 제11권3호
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• pp.23-29
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• 2019

This study acoustically examines the quality of fricatives produced by ten dysarthric speakers with cerebral palsy. Previous similar studies tend to focus only on sibilants, but to obtain a better understanding of how dysarthria affects fricatives we selected a range of samples with different places of articulation and voicing. The Universal Access (UA) Speech database was used to select thirteen words beginning with one of the English fricatives (/f/, /v/, /s/, /z/, /ʃ/, /ð/). The following four measurements were taken for both dysarthric and healthy speakers: phoneme duration, mean spectral peak, variance and skewness. Results show that even speakers with mild dysarthria have significantly longer fricatives and a lower mean spectral peak than healthy speakers. Furthermore, mean spectral peak and variance showed significant group effects for both healthy and dysarthric speakers. Mean spectral peak and variance was also useful for discriminating several places of articulation for both groups. Lastly, spectral measurements displayed important group differences when taking severity into account. These findings show that in general there is a degradation in the production of fricatives for dysarthric speakers, but difference will depend on the severity of dysarthria along with the type of measurement taken.

• The Journal of Korean Academy of Orthopedic Manual Physical Therapy
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• 제30권2호
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• pp.85-94
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• 2024

Background: This study aimed to investigate the effects of joint mobilization with movement (MWM) on pain, ankle joint range of motion, balance, and gait in patients who underwent total knee arthroplasty (TKA) and exhibited ankle joint inversion. Methods: We divided 35 patients who had undergone TKA into experimental and control groups. The intervention involved a 40-min session three times a week over 4 weeks. The control group received general physical therapy, ankle pumping exercises, Q-setting exercises, knee joint range of motion exercises, and gravity-controlled gait training. In addition to these treatments, the experimental group received MWM to evaluate knee pain, ankle joint angle, balance, and gait pre- and post-intervention. Results: Both groups experienced a decrease in pain levels, with no significant difference between the groups. Both groups also showed a significant decrease in ankle joint inversion angle, with notable differences between them. Additionally, both groups significantly increased their mean dorsiflexion angles and balance, with a significant difference observed between the groups. Although walking decreased in both groups, there was no significant difference observed between them. Conclusion: The group that received MWM treatment showed significant effects on inversion angle, dorsiflexion angle, balance, and gait. These results provide valuable insights into the potential benefits of MWM as a post-TKA intervention, while highlighting the importance of long-term follow-up studies on post-TKA lower limb alignment interventions.

• The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology
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• 제23권2호
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• pp.51-58
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• 2019

Purpose In in-vitro laboratories of nuclear medicine department, when the reagent lot or reagent lot changes Comparability test or parallel test is performed to determine whether the results between lots are reliable. The most commonly used standard domestic laboratories is to obtain %difference from the difference in results between two lots of reagents, and then many laboratories are set the standard to less than 20% at low concentrations and less than 10% at medium and high concentrations. If the range is deviated from the standard, the test is considered failed and it is repeated until the result falls within the standard range. In this study, several tests are selected that are performed in nuclear medicine in-vitro laboratories to analyze parallel test results and to establish criteria for customized percent difference for each test. Materials and Methods From January to November 2018, the result of parallel test for reagent lot change is analyzed for 7 items including thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH), free thyroxine (FT4), carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA), CA-125, prostate-specific antigen (PSA), HBs-Ab and Insulin. The RIA-MAT 280 system which adopted the principle of IRMA is used for TSH, FT4, CEA, CA-125 and PSA. TECAN automated dispensing equipment and GAMMA-10 is used to measure insulin test. For the test of HBs-Ab, HAMILTON automated dispensing equipment and Cobra Gamma ray measuring instrument are used. Separate reagent, customized calibrator and quality control materials are used in this experiment. Results 1. TSH [%diffrence Max / Mean / Median] (P-value by t-test > 0.05) C-1(low concentration) [14.8 / 4.4 / 3.7 / 0.0 ] C-2(middle concentration) [10.1 / 4.2 / 3.7 / 0.0] 2. FT4 [%diffrence Max / Mean / Median] (P-value by t-test > 0.05) C-1(low concentration) [10.0 / 4.2 / 3.9 / 0.0] C-2(high concentration) [9.6 / 3.3 / 3.1 / 0.0 ] 3. CA-125 [%diffrence Max / Mean / Median] (P-value by t-test > 0.05) C-1(middle concentration) [9.6 / 4.3 / 4.3 / 0.3] C-2(high concentration) [6.5 / 3.5 / 4.3 / 0.4] 4. CEA [%diffrence Max / Mean / median] (P-value by t-test > 0.05) C-1(low concentration) [9.8 / 4.2 / 3.0 / 0.0] C-2(middle concentration) [8.7 / 3.7 / 2.3 / 0.3] 5. PSA [%diffrence Max / Mean / Median] (P-value by t-test > 0.05) C-1(low concentration) [15.4 / 7.6 / 8.2 / 0.0] C-2(middle concentration) [8.8 / 4.5 / 4.8 / 0.9] 6. HBs-Ab [%diffrence Max / Mean / Median] (P-value by t-test > 0.05) C-1(middle concentration) [9.6 / 3.7 / 2.7 / 0.2] C-2(high concentration) [8.9 / 4.1 / 3.6 / 0.3] 7. Insulin [%diffrence Max / Mean / Median] (P-value by t-test > 0.05) C-1(middle concentration) [8.7 / 3.1 / 2.4 / 0.9] C-2(high concentration) [8.3 / 3.2 / 1.5 / 0.1] In some low concentration measurements, the percent difference is found above 10 to nearly 15 percent in result of target value calculated at a lower concentration. In addition, when the value is measured after Standard level 6, which is the highest value of reagents in the dispensing sequence, the result would have been affected by a hook effect. Overall, there was no significant difference in lot change of quality control material (p-value>0.05). Conclusion Variations between reagent lots are not large in immunoradiometric assays. It is likely that this is due to the selection of items that have relatively high detection rate in the immunoradiometric method and several remeasurements. In most test results, the difference was less than 10 percent, which was within the standard range. TSH control level 1 and PSA control level 1, which have low concentration target value, exceeded 10 percent more than twice, but it did not result in a value that was near 20 percent. As a result, it is required to perform a longer period of observation for more homogenized average results and to obtain laboratory-specific acceptance criteria for each item. Also, it is advised to study observations considering various variables.

• Women's Health Nursing
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• 제7권3호
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• pp.348-358
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• 2001

This study was designed to identify the relationship between the level of sense of coherence(SOC) and coping resources of nurses working in hospital. The subjects of this study were 248 nurses working at C University hospital in Seoul. The data was collected during the period from July 1. to July 14. 2001. The insruments for this study were SOC scale by Antonovsky(1987) and Coping Resources Inventory by author. The analysis of data was done by simple statistics, ANOVA and Pearson correlation coefficient with SAS program. The results of this study were as follows: 1. Total mean SOC was 132.1/203.0 with a range 96.0 to 171.0. The mean score of this item was arranged according to three areas. The meaningfulness was 4.9, managability was 4.7, and comprehensibility was 4.2. 2. Total mean coping resources was 144.5/225.0 with a range 93.0 to 190.0. The highest mean score of item according to the area was social support 4.0 and the lowest mean score was self care coping 2.7. 3. A significant statistical difference between age, religion, spending money and SOC was found. 4. Significant statistical difference between age, educational level, spending money, working period and coping resources were found. 5. Coping resources by the level of SOC was high in the highest group of SOC(F=6.19, p=0.00). With respect to the area of coping resources, higher group of SOC was using much coping resources generally except area of leisure. 6. SOC was positively related to age(r=0.17), working periods(r=0.16), each SOC area, coping resources and all area of them except leisure. 7. The coping resources were positively related to age(r=0.21), working periods(r=0.21), SOC (r=0.49), each coping resources area, and each SOC area. In conclusion, we confirmed that the level of SOC of the subjects was low relatively and the high level of sense of coherence was related to the high score of coping resources. Therefore, it could also contribute to select suitable nurses in their fields. In the future, it's necessary to develop strategies improving SOC.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• 제4권3호
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• pp.85-92
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• 2012

It is a well-known phenomenon that vowel duration in English is generally longer before a voiced stop than a voiceless one. Past research has postulated that the closure duration of the voiceless stop is generally longer than that of the voiced stop and that the duration of a preceding vowel is determined complementarily by the closure duration of the stop. To shed further light on the phenomenon, this study examined fourteen native speakers of American English who read the monosyllabic words [bVC] (V = [i, ɪ, eɪ, ɛ, æ, ʌ, ɑ], C = [t, d]). First, we found that mean vowel duration was 38 ms longer before the voiced stop than the voiceless (mean duration ratio = 1.24). Second, mean closure duration of the voiced stop was only shorter by 5 ms compared to the voiceless stop (mean duration ratio = 0.97). Therefore, for our subjects, vowel duration was not determined complementarily by the closure duration of the following stop. Third, vowels with longer inherent durations (viz., tense, diphthong, and low vowels) tended to show larger duration ratios in the voiced and voiceless contexts than the vowels with shorter durations (viz., lax vowels). This indicates that the lengthening of inherently shorter vowels before a voiced stop is limited in order to avoid overlapping with longer vowels in the duration range. Fourth, there was no significant gender difference in vowel duration ratios in the contexts of voiced and voiceless stops. Finally, considerable individual differences were found in the vowel and consonant duration ratios.

• Women's Health Nursing
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• 제8권2호
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• pp.151-164
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• 2002

PURPOSE: Estrogen replacement therapy is indicated for the relief of hot flushes and urogenital atrophy, the prevention of osteoporosis and the reduction in risk of cardiovascular disease. The present study assessed by blood pressure, heart rate variability, and climacteric symptoms in menopausal women before treatment and at 1 month during estrogen replacement therapy. METHODS: The study sample consisted of 16 healthy menopausal women (range 49 to 59 years, mean : 53.4 years) attending menopausal clinics for the complaint of climateric symptoms at S. hospital in Chunchoen. They were all non-smokers and no patient had symptoms or evidence of cardiovascular disease. They took estrogen replacement therapy (conjugated estrogen 0.625 mg with or without medroxy progesteron 2.5mg) for 1 month. Blood pressure, heart rate variability(heart period and vagal tone) through ECG, and climacteric symptom were measured in all subjects before treatment and at 1 month during treatment. Climacteric symptom questionnaire which was developed by Neugarten et al.(1963) was modified with 20 items of question(Cronbach's alpha = 88 -.89). The data was collected from Sept. 1. 2000 to July. 30. 2001. RESULTS: There was no significant difference in mean systolic and diastolic pressure between the baseline and at 1 month during treatment. The mean heart period and vagal tone were slightly increased, but difference of mean heart period and vagal tone were not statistically significant between the baseline and at 1 month during treatment. The score of climacteric symptoms decreased significantly from the baseline after treatment. CONCLUSIONS: Even though, this study did not show that estrogen replacement therapy led decrease of blood pressure and increase heart rate variability, climacteric symptoms reduced much in all subjects after taking drugs. These results suggest that there is need to repeat study with long term period.

• Korean Journal of Community Nutrition
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• 제6권1호
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• pp.76-83
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• 2001

This study was designed to determine serum osmolality and to investigate the association among serum osmolality, health-related factors and biochemical indices. Two hundred thirty seven elderly(86 male, 151 female : mean age 73.8) residing in the chungbuk area participated. Sociodemographic data and self-perceived health status were obtained by interview, and biochemical parameters were measured. The mean serum osmolaity was 301.2$\pm$10.1 mOsm/kg(range 240.8~328.9 mOsm/kg) and serum osmolality of the females(302.4 mOsm/kg) was significantly(p＜0.05) higher than that of the males(299.0 mOsm/kg). Only 11.0% of the elderly were within the accepted normal range(280~295 mOsm/kg) and the majority of the subjects were in a hyperosmolar state(60.8% : 296~307 mOsm/kg). It was observed that serum osmolality was reduced with increasing age but not statistically significant. There was no significant difference in serum osmolality according to marital status. Serum osmolality was significantly lower(p＜0.05) in the elderly with higher self-perceived health scores than the elderly with lower self-perceived health scores, however no significant difference was observed between the presence or absence of disease. Serum osmolality tended to be higher(p=0.06) in the elderly with difficulty in mobility than the elderly who have no problem in mobility. Serum osmolality tended to be higher(p=0.06) among drug users compared to that of non-users. There was a significant association between serum osmolality and serum albumin in females but not in males. Significant associations were shown between serum osmolality and serum transferrin in both sexes. However, there was no significant correlation between serum osmolality and hemoglobin or hematocrit except with hematocrit in females only. The results of this study indicated that the elderly were dehydrated and hydration state seems to influence health status and, the elderly should be encouraged to drink an adequate amount of fluids. Also, the hydration state is required to be assessed and considered for the interpretation of biochemical parameters.

• Women's Health Nursing
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• 제8권3호
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• pp.358-370
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• 2002

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between college women's resourcefulness and health promoting behaviors. The subjects were 215 college women students who were non-married and ranged in grade from 1 to 4. Data was collected from Nov. 1 to Nov. 30, 2001 by a structured questionnaires. The instruments, which were modified by researcher and used for this study, were the revised Health Promotion Lifestyle Profile (HPLP) developed by Walker, Sechrist and Pender(1987), the Resourcefulness developed by Rosenbaum(1980) and the general characteristic scale developed by the researcher. The data were analyzed by the SPSS/PC+ program using t-test, ANOVA, Pearson Correlation Coefficient and stepwise multiple regression. The results were as follows : 1. The mean score of resourcefulness was 109.29(range:$36\sim180$). 2.There were statistically significant difference in the score of resourcefulness according to the grade(F=2.889, P=.037) and drinking(t=-3.264, P=.002). 3.The mean score of health promoting behaviors was 107.21(range: 44~176). 4.There were statistically significant difference in the score of the health promoting behaviors according to the grade(F=.141, P=.039), smoking(t=-3.314, P=.008) and drinking (t=-4.091, P=.000). 5. College women's degree of resourcefulness showed a positive correlation with the degree of health promoting behavior (r=.573, P=.000). 6. By means of multiple regression analysis, the resourcefulness provided explained 32.9% of health promoting behavior. In conclusion, the resourcefulness should be considered when developing nursing strategies for college women, especially when dealing with the health promoting behaviors. The recommendations from this study necessitate of further studies to investigate how smoking and drinking have an effect on the health promoting behaviors.

• Women's Health Nursing
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• 제6권2호
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• pp.218-233
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• 2000

The purposes of this study were to investigate the physical discomforts and sexual life pattern and to identify the relation between the physical discomforts and the satisfaction of sexual life in women with hysterectomy. The subject were 301 women who lived with their spouses from 3 months to 2 years after hysterectomy in S. University Hospital. The data were collected using a self-reported questionnaire by mail, which composed of 25 items of physical discomforts, restarting time and frequency of sexual intercourse, and 10 items of sexual satisfaction, The results were as follows: 1) The mean score of physical discomforts was 13.22 and range of score was 0-45. 1.7% of 301 women had no physical discomforts and 12.0% of them complained of severe physical discomforts such as fatigue, lumbago and pain of extremities. 2) The women with hysterectomy complained of fatigue(76.1%), lumbago(68.8%), pain of extremities(63.5%), weight gain(55.5%), vaginal dryness(50.8%) and symptom of estrogen deficiency such as perspiration (47.5%), flush(41.2%) and palpitation (38.5%). As unusual symptom, numbness of thigh (20.3%) and acne(16.3%) were identified. 3) There was no significant difference between the degree of physical discomforts and the laps of time after hysterectomy. But the score of physical discomforts was lower in women with vaginal hysterectomy than in women with abdominal hysterectomy. 4) The mean score of sexual satisfaction was 33.11 and range of score was 10-50. There was no significant difference between the degree of sexual satisfaction and the lapse of time after hysterectomy. 83.8% of women had not change of sexual life satisfaction after hysterectomy. The women restarted sexual intercourse in average 2.57 months after hysterectomy. 5) There was a negative correlation between the physical discomforts and the sexual satisfaction. In conclusion, nurses should make the discharge educational program of the physical discomforts and the sexual pattern for women with hysterectomy in hospital.