• The Journal of the Korea institute of electronic communication sciences
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• 제19권3호
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• pp.577-582
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• 2024

In 2007, the first domestic pet insurance policies were introduced, and by 2023, numerous insurance products had been developed. The pet insurance market has been expanding steadily. However, as of 2022, only 0.8% of all pet owners have subscribed to pet insurance. Pet owners hesitate to enroll in pet insurance due to expensive premiums, unclear coverage details, and strict enrollment criteria. This paper proposes a model capable of detecting pet eye diseases and predicting their health age. Initially, EfficientNet is employed to identify the pet's eye disease, while OpenCV is utilized to locate and measure the size of the disease, enabling the calculation of the pet's healthy age. By leveraging the calculated health age, the aim is to aid insurance companies in determining pet insurance premiums. This model can facilitate the calculation of reasonable pet insurance rates based on the pet's eye condition and health age. Ultimately, the objective is to implement a system capable of detecting pet eye conditions and predicting their health age.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
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• 제14권6호
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• pp.801-810
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• 2020

In this study, the health insurance application of PET and the change in the pay standard were examined, and the amount of health insurance use over the past 10 years was analyzed. Positron tomography was applied as health insurance in 2006, and after ¹⁸F-FDG was first applied as health insurance, positron tomography tests using various radioactive isotopes have been applied as health insurance. As of 2019, the number of positron emission tomography tests was 198,651 cases, and the treatment amount was about 88.3 billion won, and the number of tests according to general characteristics was higher in men than in women, and by age, the number of tests was the highest in 60s. The number of outpatient examinations was higher than that of inpatient examinations, and the number of examinations in tertiary hospitals(68.2%) was significantly higher than that of general hospitals and hospitals. As for the test site, torso test was the most common at 86.6%, and radioisotope was the most at 93.6% using ¹⁸F-FDG. The change in the use of PET for 10 years increased steadily from 2010 to 2014, but the amount of use decreased sharply afterwards as the recognition of asymptomatic long-term follow-up tests was deleted due to the government's change in health insurance application standards in 2014. As changes in health insurance standards have a great influence on changes in health insurance usage, continuous monitoring will be required in the future.

• The Korean Journal of Health Service Management
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• 제8권4호
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• pp.25-34
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• 2014

This paper examined the effects of private health insurance (PHI) on the use of endoscopy, sonography, CT, MRI, and PET among Koreans. The data used was the four waves of the Korea Health Panel (2008-2011), and the number of subjects was 141,862 visits. We employed a pooled logistic regression mode which was corrected with cluster errors. The results showed that PHI was positively related to the use of endoscopy, but not related to the use of sonography, CT, MRI, and PET. It is, however, recommended that health policy makers pay attention to the effects of PHI on the use of sonography, CT, MRI, and PET.

• 대한핵의학회:학술대회논문집
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• 대한핵의학회 2002년도 춘계학술대회 및 총회
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• pp.45-53
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• 2002

Positron Emission Tomography(PET) was introduced as a research tool in the 1970s and it took about 20 years before PET became an useful clinical imaging modality. In the USA, insurance coverage for PET procedures in the 1990s was the turning point, I believe, for this progress. Initially PET was used in neurology but recently more than 80% of PET procedures are in oncological applications. I firmly believe, in the 21st century, one can not manage cancer patients properly without PET and PET is very important medical imaging modality in basic and clinical sciences. PET is grouped into 2 categories : conventional(c) and gamma camera $based_{(CB)}$ PET. $_{CB}PET$ is more readily available utilizing dual-head gamma cameras and commercially available FDG to many medical centers at low cost to patients. In fact there are more $_{CB}PET$ in operation than cPET in the USA. $_{CB}PET$ is inferior to cPET in its performance but clinical studies in oncology is feasible without expensive infrastructures such as staffing, rooms and equipments. At Ajou university Hospital, CBPET was installed in late 1997 for the first time in Korea as well as in Asia and the system has been used successfully and effectively in oncological applications. Ours was the fourth PET operation in Korea and I believe this may have been instrumental for other institutions got interested in clinical PET. The fellowing is a brief description of our clinical experience of FDG CBPET in oncology.

• Health Policy and Management
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• 제14권3호
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• pp.45-65
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• 2004

The rapid increase in PET devices and its utilization in Korea necessitates relevant health insurance policies based on scientific evidence, including economic evaluation of PET in clinical conditions. However, there is very little amount of evidence regarding PET, and the first step would be to establish research priorities to give a momentum for research and assure efficient use of research capacities. To this end, we conducted a two-round Delphi study, which produced stable consensus on about top 10 oncology indications for research, which included lymphoma staging, colorectal cancer recurrence/restaging, lung cancer staging, and other conditions. The results were largely consistent with current U.S. Medicare reimbursement indications and are expected to lead to relevant researches and evidence-based health policies on PET reimbursement and regulation.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• 제30권4호
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• pp.185-196
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• 2005

Although medical exposure from diagnostic radiology procedures such as conventional x-rays, CT and PET scans is necessary for healthcare purposes, understanding its characteristics and size of the resulting radiation dose to patients is much of worth because medical radiation constitutes the largest artificial source of exposure and the medical exposure is in a trend of fast increasing particularly in the developed society. Annual collective doses and per-caput effective doses from different radiology procedures in Korea were estimated by combining the effective dose estimates per single medical procedure and the health insurance statistics in 2002. Values of the effective dose per single procedure were compiled from different sources including NRPB reports, ICRP 80, MIRDOSE3.1 code and independent computations of the authors. The annual collective dose reaches 27440 man-Sv (diagnostic radiology: 22880 man-Sv, nuclear medicine: 4560 man-Sv) which is reduced to the annual per-caput effective dose of 0.58 mSv by dividing by the national population of 47.7 millions. The collective dose is far larger than that of occupational exposures, in the country operated 16 nuclear power plants in 2002, which is no more than 70 man-Sv in the same year. It is particularly noted that the collective dose due to CT scans amounts 9960 man-Sv. These results implies that the national policy for radiation protection should pay much more attention to optimization of patient doses in medicine.

• The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology
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• 제14권2호
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• pp.177-180
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• 2010

Purpose: As PET test came to be covered by the pay system of medical insurance (July 1, 2006) and the needs for it becoming increased for laboratory purpose, it became necessary to purchase expensive medical equipments to solve those problems. However, as most of equipments that are operated by cyclotron are very expensive as to amount from tens of millions up to hundreds of millions of won, it is difficult to purchase those equipments from the point of medical organizations. It may be possible to self manufacture those equipments with least costs if their parts functions that meets the operators demands. The Nuclear Medicine department of National Cancer Center (NCC) is trying to manufacture and use equipments that can be made with least costs, including introducing 2 medical equipments that can improves the operator's works. Materials and Methods: Example 1: Self production of radioisotope($^{18}F$) divider was fabricated. The NCC's Nuclear Medicine department acquired one acrylic panel, seven 3-way valve, tubing etc. that can be found in the market to make the main body of divider in cooperation with biomedical engineering, and placed them inside hot cell, and installed switching box outside of hot cell to make it possible to control them from outside. This main body of divider were placed in radioisotope transfer line that are manufactured in the cyclotron. Example 2: Self production of $^{18}F$-FDG automated divider was fabricated. The NCC's Nuclear Medicine department used cavro pump syringe that consists the main body of divider in cooperation with biomedical engineering, biomedical engineering developed programs that divides a certain amount. $^{18}F$-FDG automated divider is placed inside hot cell, and cable chords were used in the equipment, and then it was connected to PC outside hot cell to make it possible to control the $^{18}F$-FDG automated divider. Results: From the NCC's Nuclear Medicine department tests that were carried out from March, 2007 until now, we found out that radioisotope can be sent to radiopharmaceuticals composite module we want, and from the tests that are carried out at NCC's Nuclear Medicine department using $^{18}F$-FDG automated divider since August, 2009 it was possible to distribute radiopharmaceuticals into vial intended. Conclusion: Through the two examples above, we found out that costs can be reduced by self manufacturing expensive equipments from NCC's cyclotron room with least costs. Also, it decreased radiation exposure dose on workers, and set up problem solving processes in cooperation with lots of parties related.