• Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.17-28
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• 2004

Purpose: Even though there have been various efforts for the dying with dignity of terminal patients, no researches focused on the public attitudes. Methods: In February 2004, we sampled 1,055 persons over 20 years of age from the sixteen cities and local districts of Korea through the quota sampling method according to their gender, age, and location. We conducted a telephone survey with a structured questionnaire on the attitudes toward dying with dignity and hospice palliative care. Results: The most important conditions for the dying with dignity on the patients' views were 'removing burdens for other people' (27.8%). Over the half of the samples chose their home as a preference for place of death (54.8%). 82.3% of the respondents agreed to the idea of withdrawing the medically futile life-sustaining treatment. Fifty seven percents of the answered public said that they intended to use the hospice service in case of terminal illness. Eighty percents thought that health care insurance should cover hospice service, and 80.9% gave positive response to the necessity of advance directives. Respondents emphasized 'the financial support for the terminal patients' (29.8%), 'covering hospice service with health insurance' (16.5%), and 'the education and public relation for settlement of desirable dying culture and hospice service' (15.9%) as the roles and responsibilities of the government for the dying with dignity. Conclusion: This study shows that there is a possibility of significant consensus on hospice and palliative care system for the dying with dignity of patients and reduction of the suffering for their families among the general public.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.10
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• pp.4251-4254
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• 2014

Background: Treatment of anemia is an important issue in the palliative care setting. Blood transfusion is generally used for this purpose in supportive care. However the place of blood transfusion in terminally ill cancer cases is less far established. Objective: We aimed to outline the use of transfusions and to find the impact of blood transfusion on survival in patients with advanced cancer and very near to death. Design: Patients dying in 2010-2011 with advanced cancer were included in the study. We retrospectively collected the data including age, type of cancer, the duration of last hospitalisation, ECOG performance status, Hb levels, transfusion history of erythrocytes and platelets, cause and the amount of transfusion. The anaemic patients who had transfusion at admission were compared with the group who were not transfused. Survival was defined as the time between the admission of last hospitalisation period and death. Results: Three hundred and ninety eight people with solid tumours died in 2010-2011 in our clinic. Ninety percent of the patients had anemia at the time of last hospitalisation. One hundred fifty three patients had erythrocyte transfusion at admission during the last hospitalisation period (38.4%). In the anaemic population the duration of last hospitalisation was longer in patients who had erythrocyte transfusion (15 days vs 8 days, p<0.001). Conclusions: Patients who had blood transfusion at the end of life lived significantly longer than the anaemic patients who were not transfused. This study remarks that blood transfusions should not be withheld from terminal cancer patients in palliative care.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.24 no.10
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• pp.1413-1420
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• 2014

Phytate is an antinutritional factor that impacts the bioavailability of essential minerals such as $Ca^{2+}$, $Mg^{2+}$, $Mn^{2+}$, $Zn^{2+}$, and $Fe^{2+}$ by forming insoluble mineral-phytate salts. These insoluble mineral-phytate salts are hydrolyzed rarely by monogastric animals, because they lack the hydrolyzing phytases and thus excrete the majority of them. The ${\beta}$-propeller phytases (BPPs) hydrolyze these insoluble mineral-phytate salts efficiently. In this study, we cloned a novel BPP gene from a marine Pseudomonas sp. This Pseudomonas BPP gene (PsBPP) had low sequence identity with other known phytases and contained an extra internal repeat domain (residues 24-279) and a typical BPP domain (residues 280-634) at the C-terminus. Structure-based sequence alignment suggested that the N-terminal repeat domain did not possess the active-site residues, whereas the C-terminal BPP domain contained multiple calcium-binding sites, which provide a favorable electrostatic environment for substrate binding and catalytic activity. Thus, we overexpressed the BPP domain from Pseudomonas sp. to potentially hydrolyze insoluble mineral-phytate salts. Purified recombinant PsBPP required $Ca^{2+}$ or $Fe^{2+}$ for phytase activity, indicating that PsBPP hydrolyzes insoluble $Fe^{2+}$-phytate or $Ca^{2+}$-phytate salts. The optimal temperature and pH for the hydrolysis of $Ca^{2+}$-phytate by PsBPP were $50^{\circ}C$ and 6.0, respectively. Biochemical and kinetic studies clearly showed that PsBPP efficiently hydrolyzed $Ca^{2+}$-phytate salts and yielded myo-inositol 2,4,6-trisphosphate and three phosphate groups as final products. Finally, we showed that PsBPP was highly effective for hydrolyzing rice bran with high phytate content. Taken together, our results suggest that PsBPP has great potential in the animal feed industry for reducing phytates.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Applied Pharmacology
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• 1994.04a
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• pp.262-262
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• 1994

Ras oncogene의 산물로서 대부분의 암조직이나 transformed human cell에서 거의 공통적으로 발견되는 p21 단백질은 C-terminal processing에 의해 먼저 C-terminal cysyeine에 palmition 된 후 carboxylmethylation 된다. Palmitation은 transforming activity의 요건인 세포막에 대한 친화력을 유지시키기 위한것으로 추측되며, cysteine residue의 carboxylmethylation의 의미는 아직 확실히 밝혀지고 있지 않으나 세포막에 대한 친화력을 증가 시키는 것으로 추측되고있다. 본 연구에서는 S-Farnesylcysteine Methyltransferase의 기질로서 N-acetyl-S-trans, trans-farnesyl-L-cysteine(AFC)을 합성하였으며, 본 실험실에서 계속 연구하여 온 돼지 간장으로 부터 정제한 천연 단백성 Methylation Inhibitor의 S-Farnesylcysteine Methyltransferase 활성에 대한 억제효과를 검색하였다. 천연 단백성 Methylation Inhibitor는 돼지 간조직의 soluble fraction을 열처리하여 Sephadex G-25 column chromatngraphy한 후 reverse phase HPLC로 정제하였다. 본 inhibitor는 약 10개의 아미노산으로 구성된 peptide성 천연물질로 분자량은 1,400 Da 으로서 합성한 AFC를 기질로 하였을 때, 흰쥐 뇌 조직내 S-Farnesylcysteine methyltransferase에 대한 $IC_{50}$/은 0,82 $\times$ $10^{-6}$ M이었으며 또한 human cancer cell line의 S-Farnesylcysteine Methyltransferase에 대해서도 현저한 저해효과를 나타내었다.

• Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.234-244
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• 2005

As Korea has just turned into an aging society with the increase of average life expectancy, and the main causes of deaths is cancer and other chronic diseases. And this corresponds to a dramatic increase in medical expenses for the aged. To curve this problem, the hospice care can be an effective alternative, which can provide patients with both quality service and intensive care to help ensure high quality life for the patients. To demonstrate the economical effect of hospice services, a comparative study on the media expenses of geriatric hospitals and general hospitals, which bear similarities in common regarding the characteristics of their patients, is performed. Thus the results of the study can serve as a quantitative indication for the management of hospice services.

• Journal of The Korea Institute of Healthcare Architecture
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.39-48
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• 2008

Well-dying is as important as Well-Being because dying is also a natural part of life. Recently, due to the change of lifestyles, cancer, AIDS and other chronic diseases cause drastic increase of mortality rate. Needs for hospice services are growing as many terminal patients interested in quality of life during their end of life period. They want calm and dignity in case process as well as pain-relieving. However, there is not many researches on the architectural planning of hospice facilities and their service system as well as government regulations. This study focuses on the German hospice facilities which have developed advanced models through researches on service contents and architectural planning. The purpose of this study is to provide fundamental data for designing hospice facilities through analyzing 7 cases of German hospice facilities with different characteristics.

• Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.133-137
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• 2022

A 72-year-old woman with metastatic lung cancer to bone and brain and with left external iliac vein thrombosis was under the care of a community palliative care provider. She experienced an acute pain crisis due to acute limb ischemia of the left lower limb. Goals-of-care discussions were held with the patient and her family; she prioritized symptom control and end-of-life care at home. The family and patient were aware of her short prognosis. Her complex pain was managed by the community palliative team, and her family was empowered to give subcutaneous injections. We illustrate a case showing the importance of community health services with palliative care support in providing symptom management and support to patient and family caregivers throughout the course of a life-limiting illness. It also highlights family caregivers' potential psychological distress in delivering subcutaneous injections in terminal care for a patient at home.

• Journal of Radiopharmaceuticals and Molecular Probes
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.153-159
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• 2021

This article provides an efficient ¹⁸F-labeling protocol based on a rapid condensation reaction between 2-cyanobenzothiazole (CBT) and N-terminal cysteine-containing biomolecules. The ¹⁸F-labeled CBT (¹⁸F-1) was prepared by radiofluorination of the tosylated precursor 4 with 18-crown-6/K+/[¹⁸F]F- complex. Using the purified ¹⁸F-1, ¹⁸F-labeled peptide (¹⁸F-7) and protein (¹⁸F-8) could be synthesized efficiently under mild conditions. This strategy would provide a convenient approach for rapid and site-specific ¹⁸F-labeling of various peptides and proteins for in vivo imaging and biomedical applications.

• Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.145-148
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• 2023

Preserving dignity is a significant concern for individuals approaching the end of their lives, as they face an increasing number of conditions that can potentially compromise their dignity. This article discusses dignity therapy as one intervention method aimed at enhancing the psychological and spiritual well-being of patients with terminal illnesses. Dignity therapy is an empirically supported therapeutic intervention that interviews patients with nine questions about what is important to them and what they want to remember, culminating in the production of a document based on these conversations. This intervention serves as a valuable tool and framework, enabling clinical professionals to reflect on dignity. It also provides clinicians with a medium to connect with patients on a deeply human level.

• Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.139-197
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• 2022

Patients with terminal cancer experience very severe symptoms during the end of life, and palliative sedation (PS) may be considered if those symptoms are refractory to any other treatment. This brief report presents ethical considerations, practices, and recent concerns on PS. PS is quite different from euthanasia. There is a lack of consensus and standards on protocols, but its notable effects have been reported in hospice care settings. Most studies to date have reported no difference in survival between patients receiving PS and those not, and PS must be conducted proportionally with the lightest level of sedation. The most common indication for PS is delirium, and midazolam is the main sedative used. It is recommended that information regarding PS should be provided to patients and their caregivers repeatedly as early as possible. Existential suffering alone is not an indication for PS, and there is a lack of evidence on bispectral analysis. Additional research on PS is needed in Korea.