• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.317-326
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• 2024

Background: Dust generated during various wood-related activities, such as cutting, sanding, or processing wood materials, can pose significant health and environmental risks due to its potential to cause respiratory problems and contribute to air pollution. Understanding the factors influencing dust emission is important for devising effective mitigation strategies, ensuring a safer working environment, and minimizing environmental impact. This study focuses on developing an artificial neural network (ANN) model to predict dust emission values in the machining of black poplar (Populus nigra L.), oriental beech (Fagus orientalis L.), and medium-density fiberboards. Methods: The multilayer feed-forward ANN model is developed using a customized application built with MATLAB code. The inputs to the ANN model include material type, cutting width, number of blades, and cutting depth, whereas the output is the dust emission. Model performance is assessed through graphical and statistical comparisons. Results: The results reveal that the developed ANN model can provide adequate predictions for dust emission with an acceptable level of accuracy. Through the implementation of the ANN model, the study predicts intermediate dust emission values for different cutting widths and cutting depths, which are not considered in the experimental work. It is observed that dust emission tends to decrease with reductions in cutting width and cutting depth. Conclusion: This study introduces an alternative approach to optimize machining-process conditions for minimizing dust emissions. The findings of this research will assist industries in obtaining dust emission values without the need for additional experimental activities, thereby reducing experimental time and costs.

• Journal of Society of Preventive Korean Medicine
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.69-75
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• 2016

Objectives : The aim of this study is to introduce the Korean medicine respiratory management program in public health center and to analyze the effects of that program. Methods : The respiratory management program was targeted on 22 soldiers during March 2016. The interventions of this program were herbal medicines (Gilgyung-tang and so on), aromatherapy, peppermint tea, fine dust mask, and health education. Data were collected by retrospective reviewing medical chart and analyzed using SPSS 18.0. Results : Total symptoms scores were measured by 4-point likert scale. Total score was $5.50{\pm}4.848$ at 1st week and $3.27{\pm}3.058$ at 4th week (p=0.008). The severity of respiratory discomfort reduced by $-1.14{\pm}2.46$ compared with last year. The satisfaction score was $7.82{\pm}4.16$. The most hoping program was muscular skeletal disease management program. Conclusions : This study suggests that Korean medical world should prepare countermeasures to cope with diseases caused by air pollution.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.309-315
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• 2012

Objectives: Animal husbandry workers could be exposed to various work hazards including toxic gases, chemicals such as pesticides or organic dust. Immunological evaluation focusing on respiratory allergic hypersensitivity occurrence was under-taken for swine farm workers as a part of the study on immunologic status of dairy barn, swine confinement, and poultry farm workers. Materials and Methods: Peripheral bloods were collected from 25 workers at the year of 2001 and 12 workers at the year of 2012 from swine farms located at Gyeonggi province, Korea. Seven adults not involved with animal husbandry were recruited at the year of 2001 from the same residential area as the swine farm workers'. Level of plasma IgE and 20 respiratory allergen-specific IgE were evaluated using commercially available ELISA kit. Results: Plasma IgE level was approximately five-fold higher in the swine farm workers regardless of the sampling year than the control subjects. Plant allergens from outdoor environments such as golden rod, pigweed, Russian thistle, or ragweed were the major allergens with positive reaction(allergen specific IgE${\geq}$0.7 IU/mL) for the swine farm workers at 2001 year. Meanwhile, house dust mite(Dermatophagoides farinae, D. pteronyssinus) and cockroach, typical indoor allergens in Korea, were the major respiratory allergens for the swine farm workers at 2012 year. Conclusions: Overall, even though our results are primitive, the results suggest that immunological function of swine farm workers could be modulated toward type-2 reactivity.

• The Journal of Korean Medicine
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• v.40 no.3
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• pp.87-98
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• 2019

Objectives: Patients with respiratory diseases are increasing as air pollution due to fine dust gets worse. Diseases that occupy a large proportion of respiratory diseases in medical institutions are acute bronchitis, chronic bronchitis and Allergic rhinitis. The number of patients with all three diseases is gradually increasing. This study was to suggest assignment of medicine policy for improving accessibility to Korean medical treatment of respiratory diseases analyzing the current treatment status of acute bronchitis, Chronic bronchitis and Allergic rhinitis patients in Western medical and Korean medical institutes in this situation. Methods: This study used 2017 National patient sample data from the Korean Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service for research. Acute bronchitis, Chronic bronchitis, Allergic rhinitis was according to KCD code. This research contains Socio-demographic analysis classified by sex and age, the number of three disease's patients. Also the number of medical treatment, the expense of recuperation cost, medical practices were analyzed compare with Western and Korean medicine. Results: The incidence of three diseases is higher among female than male. There are many patients under the age of 10 in the case of acute bronchitis and allergic rhinitis, while there are many patients over 50 years of age in chronic bronchitis. Western medical treatment take up a larger proportion than Korean medical treatment in part of the number of three disease's patients, the number of medical treatment, the expense of recuperation cost. Conclusions: Much more patients of these diseases visit in Western medical clinic and hospital than Korean medical clinic and hospital for treatment. There are many parts of Korean medical treatment that are not covered by Health insurance benefits like herbal decoction, pharmacopuncture, etc. Korean medicine need to do the efforts for expanding medical field in variety. Also it is demanded for institutional support for reduction of the cost burden and improving on accessibility of Korean medical treatment in order to treat with the increase in respiratory diseases due to fine dust.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.83 no.2
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• pp.116-121
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• 2020

Particulate matter (PM) is suspended dust that has a diameter of <10 ㎛ and can be inhaled by humans and deposited in the lungs, particularly the alveoli. Recent studies have shown that PM has an adverse effect on respiratory diseases. The aim of this article is to review respiratory diseases associated with PM. According to existing studies, PM is associated with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, bronchial asthma, and several other respiratory diseases and increases the mortality rates of these diseases. Moreover, increased exposure in the high concentration of atmospheric PM is associated with the development of lung cancer. The most simple and common way to protect an individual from airborne PM is to wear a face mask that filters out PM. In areas of high concentration PM, it is recommended to wear a face mask to minimize the exposure to PM. However, the use of N95 or KF94 masks can interfere with respiration in patients with chronic respiratory diseases who exhibit low pulmonary function, leading to an increased risk of respiratory failure. Conclusionally, reduction of the total amount of PM is considered to be important factor and strengthening the national warning notification system to vulnerable patients and proper early management of exacerbated patients will be needed in the future.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
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• v.57 no.6
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• pp.35-46
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• 2015

Improvement in domestic poultry production has a positive effect on the export competitiveness of the poultry industry. However, overproduction and enlargement of facilities to assure a supply increase a stocking density which make a poor environment in the broiler house. In particular, an intensive rearing environment is vulnerable to dust control that causes respiratory diseases, such as asthma, bronchitis, etc., to farmers and broilers. However, monitoring data and research for environment control are not adequate, and there are no air quality regulations in broiler houses in Korea. In this study, TSP, PM10, inhalable dust and respirable dust concentration were monitored according to season, age of broiler and broiler's activities. Air quality assessment was also performed in accordance with the threshold limit value by Donham et al. (2000). The TSP concentrations were 77.5 %, 219.7 % higher and PM10 concentrations were 121.2 %, 303.8 % higher when change of season and winter respectively than summer. There were significantly different concentrations according to season and age of broiler. Inhalable and respirable dust concentration were also clearly different according to the season and age of broiler. A high dust concentration was observed, specifically exceeding the threshold limit by 119 % in the winter. In the case of the broiler's motion was activity according to worker's access into the broiler house, concentration level was 769.6 % higher than broiler's motion was stable and exceeded the threshold limit. These results suggest that the worker should put on protective equipment to protect there's respiratory health in the broiler house.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
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• v.50 no.4
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• pp.39-50
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• 2008

A study on fugitive dust dispersion was conducted at Saemanguem reclaimed area located at the west coastal area of Jeon-buk Province Total reclaimed area is 40,100ha developed by building a 33km long sea dike through Gunsan, Gimje, and Buan. (Land: 28,300ha, Fresh Water Lake: 11,800ha) After this area was completely reclaimed in 2006, there has been high possibility of dust generation and dispersion to the neighboring area. The dust generated at the reclaimed land was composed mainly of minerals with high salinity, and it could make harmful effect on crop production as well on to human's health such as eye irritation and respiratory disease. Especially, when those aerosol particles are reached on the leaves of farm crops, the photosynthesis and respiration of the plants can be under restraint resulting in the decrease of agricultural productivity of the nearby farm areas. Furthermore, highly concentrated salty particles can directly damage the leaf cells. In this study, field experiment has been conducted to regularly measure the locally suspended dust particles and analyze how they were dispersed to the neighboring areas. The collected dust particles were analyzed to examine theirs sizes, concentrations, and components. The SPSS statistical program was also used to separate the dust concentration generated by the reclaimed land from the total dust concentration measured at the measuring locations.

• Smart Media Journal
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.22-28
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• 2018

Air pollution problems in Korea are gradually becoming a higher concern due to various reasons such as fine dust, causing anxiety among people with regard to their health. Although various studies have been carried out on the relationship between the influence of fine dust and a certain disease, they are mostly focusing on the analyzation that fine dust is related to specific illnesses such as respiratory and cardiovascular diseases, hypertension and diabetes. In this paper, we utilize the public data of medical history information to extract ten medical care subjects with the highest number of monthly care in 2016, and analyze the relation of fine dust with certain medical subjects using Pearson correlation coefficient. We also subdivide and analyze the correlation between fine dust and the medical subjects according to their gender and age. Middle-aged Female group with the strongest positive correlation between fine dust and the medical subjects is analyzed with the correlation from 2011 to 2015, with its relevance coefficient extracted by regression analysis in order to predict the correlation with the medical subjects according to the fine dust concentration.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.18 no.12
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• pp.281-290
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• 2018

Concerns regarding health problems due to fine dust have rapidly grown in Korea. However, studies on fine dust cognition, knowledge and attitudes were not performed actively. The purpose of this study is to examine college students' cognition, knowledge, and attitudes regarding fine dust in Korea, and to identify the relating factors including self efficacy on theses variables. This study was descriptive research, and 206 college students of 1 university were interviewed with a structured questionnaires. We found that the fine dust cognition score was the highest, and the knowledge and attitude scores were low among college student. According to the logistic regression analysis, grade, past respiratory disease, and self-efficacy were affecting fine dust cognition, and grade, self-efficacy were affecting fine dust knowledge. It is needed to provide educational program for college students to enhance the fine dust knowledge and attitude. It is necessary to include strategy increasing the self-efficacy to the education program.

• Journal of radiological science and technology
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• v.45 no.3
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• pp.225-232
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• 2022

Fine dust threatens human health in various forms, depending on the particle size, such as by causing respiratory, cardiovascular, and brain diseases, after entering the body via the lungs. The aim of this study was to correlate fine dust exposure with changes in brain blood flow in Sprague Dawley rats by using micro-positron emission tomography and elucidate the possibility of developing cerebrovascular diseases caused by fine dust. The subjects were exposured to an average fine dust (particulate matter 2.5) of 206.2 ± 7.74 to ten rats four times a day, twice a day for 90 min. Before the experiment, they were maintained at NPO to the maximize the intake of ¹⁸F-fluorodeoxy glucose(¹⁸F-FDG) and minimize changes in the ¹⁸F-FDG biomass depending on the ambient environment and body temperature of the rats. PET images were acquired in the list mode 40 min after injecting ¹⁸F-FDG 44.4 MBq into the rats tail vein using a micro-PET scanner pre and post exposure to fine dust. We found that the whole brain level of ¹⁸F-FDG standardized uptake value in rats averaged 5.21 ± 0.52 g/mL pre and 4.22 ± 0.48 g/mL post exposure to fine dust, resulting in a statistically significant difference. Fine dust was able to alter brain activity after entering the body via the lungs in various forms depending on the particle size.