• Health Policy and Management
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.195-212
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• 2011

Objectives: This study investigates the relationship between nurse staffing levels and differences in patient outcomes in terms of average length of stay, in-hospital mortality rate and 30-day death rate in order to evaluate the effectiveness of a policy that differentiates fees for inpatients on the basis of nurse-to-bed ratios. Methods: We obtained information on inpatients from health insurance claims data published by the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service(HIRA) in 2008, organizational factors(type of hospital, ownership) from the records of the hospital report system in 2008, and nurse staffing levels, which were graded on a scale of 1 to 7, from data compiled between December 15, 2007, and September 20, 2008. The data were segregated according to type of hospital and quarter and finally 3,517 records of 1,182 hospitals were analyzed using multi-level analysis. Results: The average length of stay in grade 1~6 hospitals was lower than that in grade 7 ones, but the difference was much below one day. No significant difference was found among different grades in tertiary hospitals. Further, variations in staffing levels did not result in any significant difference in the in-hospital mortality rate and 30-day death rate. Conclusions: High nurse staffing levels did not result in better patient outcomes compared with low staffing levels. We therefore recommend modifying the above nurse staffing policy so as to make it more effective in improving patient outcomes.

• Korea Journal of Hospital Management
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.46-57
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• 2020

Objectives: The purpose of this study is to evaluate the factors affecting patient satisfaction for the nursing service of comprehensive nursing care service unit in Tertiary hospital Methods: This study employed a descriptive survey to investigate the nursing satisfaction and the study data was collected from 74 patients among 83 patient who were admitted to the nursing care integration service ward of an tertiary hospital for 10 days from May 9, 2018 to May 19, 2018. Data was analyzed by descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA, and multiple linear regression using SPSS 21 program. Results: The average with nursing satisfaction was significantly different according to marriage type and KPCS level. It was found that physical factor and educational factor have statistically significant effect on nursing satisfaction. As physical care increase by one unit, patient satisfaction increase by 0.226(95% CI; 0.061-0.390) and also satisfaction increase by 0.443(95% CI; 0.070-0.816) as education care increase by one unit. Conclusions: As a result of study, it was found that it is necessary to provide patients with more careful nursing service in physical and educational perspective, in order to improve the service quality of comprehensive nursing care service unit.

• The Korean Journal of Food And Nutrition
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.470-477
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• 2010

The purposes of this study were to identify the evaluation categories, areas, attributes of the hospital food service and to define the relative importance of the evaluation categories, areas, attributes of the hospital food service using analytic hierarchy process. A survey was conducted from January 8th to 25th in 2007. Questionnaires were mailed to the 310 directors of dietetic departments of hospitals that included 160 primary hospitals, 107 secondary hospitals, and 43 tertiary hospitals. The result of the analytic hierarchy process indicated that relative importance of evaluation category was 0.5259 for food service management and 0.3407 for nutrition care. The food service management consisted of four subcategories, which are equipment standard, sanitation, production, and delivery service. Sanitation(relative importance: 0.2652) was the most important area among the subcategories and it was followed by equipment standard(0.2067), delivery service(0.1864) and production(0.1848). The nutrition care has two subcategories, menu management and meal management. The relative importance of menu management(0.4174) was higher than that of meal management(0.3555). The quality of food service and nutrition care to inpatients can be improved by the evaluation system based on appropriate applications of the developed evaluation indicators for hospital food service systems.

• Korea Journal of Hospital Management
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.46-75
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• 2008

Main objective of this study is to investigate the factors that affect the reduction and recovery rate of hospital health insurance review departments of Korean tertiary hospitals, general hospitals and hospitals. A nationwide mail survey was conducted through structured questionnaire for chiefs and members of health insurance review departments of 178 hospitals, and data from 1,064 respondents were utilized in the final analysis. Major findings are as follows: 1) Monthly average reduction rate of surveyed hospitals was 1.18% for inpatients and 0.56% for outpatients. Also, average recovery rates from protests were 45.7% and 53.6%, respectively. 2) Average ages of health insurance review department employees were 41.5 for chiefs and 34.9 for members, and their average working period was 6.64 years. 69.1% of the respondents felt stress in their jobs, and they suggested 'communication problems with doctors' along with 'heavy workloads' as major reasons for the stress. 3) Reduction rates decreased and recovery rates increased when separate member in charge was assigned to each medical department, when health insurance review departments periodically provided medical parts with related education, and when the members participated in various committees.

• Healthcare Informatics Research
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.387-393
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• 2018

Objectives: This paper describes an experience of implementing seamless service trials online and offline by adopting Internet of Things (IoT) technology based on near-field communication (NFC) tags and Bluetooth low-energy (BLE) beacons. The services were provided for both patients and health professionals. Methods: The pilot services were implemented to enhance healthcare service quality, improve patient safety, and provide an effective business process to health professionals in a tertiary hospital in Seoul, Korea. The services to enhance healthcare service quality include healing tours, cancer information/education, psychological assessments, indoor navigation, and exercise volume checking. The services to improve patient safety are monitoring of high-risk inpatients and delivery of real-time health information in emergency situations. In addition, the services to provide an effective business process to health professionals include surveys and web services for patient management. Results: Considering the sustainability of the pilot services, we decided to pause navigation and patient monitoring services until the interference problem could be completely resolved because beacon signal interference significantly influences the quality of services. On the other hand, we had to continue to provide new wearable beacons to high-risk patients because of hygiene issues, so the cost increased over time and was much higher than expected. Conclusions: To make the smart connected hospital services sustainable, technical feasibility (e.g., beacon signal interference), economic feasibility (e.g., continuous provision of new necklace beacons), and organizational commitment and support (e.g., renewal of new alternative medical devices and infrastructure) are required.

• Journal of Korean Clinical Nursing Research
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.228-238
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• 2011

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate parent expectation and satisfaction with respect to pediatric inpatient care and to identify the variables related to parent satisfaction. Methods: The study was conducted in pediatric wards of a tertiary children's hospital in Korea. The participants were 361 parents of children who were inpatients. Data were collected using a structured questionnaire (The Pediatric Family Satisfaction Questionnaire) at the time of discharge. Results: The highest parent expectation domain was medical service. The parents were most satisfied with nursing service and least satisfied with general hospital service and accommodation. The parents expressed lower satisfaction with hospital facilities, equipment, noise, cleanliness, and communication by health care professionals. Parents with younger children reported higher expectation from the complete hospital service and those who had a longer length of stay reported higher expectation from the nursing service. Conclusion: To improve the quality of hospital services, we need to understand parent expectation and improve and provide clear communication. In addition, the general hospital service and accommodation should not be overlooked for improvement.

• Quality Improvement in Health Care
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.15-25
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• 2016

Objectives: In this study, we examined the validity of Clostridium difficile culture results as a proxy measure of Clostridium difficile infection, and inferred the epidemiologic characteristics of Clostridium difficile infection by tracking the trends of Clostridium difficile culture results. Methods: We reviewed the medical records to figure out the actual possibilities of Clostridium difficile infection of those with positive or negative results of Clostridium difficile culture during the time span from January 2012 to March 2012. We calculated the positive and negative predictive value of Clostridium difficile culture results for Clostridium difficile infection. Furthermore, epidemiologic characteristics of Clostridium difficile infection in a tertiary general hospital in 2012 were analyzed. Result: The estimated positive predictive value of Clostridium difficile culture tests for Clostridium difficile infection was 100%, and the estimated negative predictive value was around 94.4~99.3% depending on the cutoff value of possibility of Clostridium difficile infection. A total of 622 cases were identified as Clostridium difficile infection in a tertiary general hospital in 2012 and there were 4.9 patients with Clostridium difficile infection per 1,000 inpatients. Conclusion: In conclusion, we identified that Clostridium difficile culture results can be used as a proxy measure of Clostridium difficile infection.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing Administration
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.5-16
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• 2007

Purpose: This study is to verify the validity and reliability of classified items and criteria of the patient classification system(PCS) based on Park's definition of nursing intensity. Methods: An expert group of 8 persons verified the content validity of the tools. The 1817 inpatients at a tertiary hospital in Seoul, Korea were classified into 4 groups according to two tools for verifying concurrent validity and interraters' reliability. These verifications were performed from September to October, 2004. Results: Nursing domains of the tools have been divided into 12 items: hygiene, nutrition, elimination, exercise & activity, education & counseling, emotional support, communication & consciousness, treatment & examination, medication, measurement & observation, coordination of multidisciplinary team, admission & discharge & transfer management. Content validity was verified by the content validity index(above 0.75 in all 12 areas). Interraters' reliability was no significant difference in the results of the patient classification between the two raters(A group 93.75%. B group 88.24%). Concurrent validity was also verified by the agreement of two tools(73.7%). Conclusion: These results showed that the reliability and validity of the PCS based on the nursing intensity were verified. These will use an data for nursing productivity in the future.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Fundamentals of Nursing
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.444-452
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• 2012

Purpose: To explore the usefulness of previous fall history as a triage variable for inpatients. Methods: Medical records of 21,382 patients, admitted to medical units of one tertiary hospital, were analyzed retrospectively. Inpatient falls were identified from the hospital's self-report system. Non-falls in 1,125 patients were selected by a stratified matching sampling with 125 patients with falls (0.59%). A comparative and predictive accuracy analysis was conducted to describe differences between the two groups with and without a history of falls. Logistic regression was used to measure the effect size of the fall history. Results: The fall history group showed higher prevalence by 9 fold than the non-fall history group. The relationships between falls and relevant variables which were significant in the non-fall history group, were not significant for the fall history group. Falls in the fall history group were 25 times more likely than in the non-fall group. Predictive accuracy of the risk assessment tool showed almost zero specificity in the fall history group. Conclusion: The presence of fall history, the fall prevalence, variables relevant to falls, and the accuracy of the risk tool were different, which support the usefulness of the fall history as a triage variable.

• Journal of the Korean Operations Research and Management Science Society
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• v.37 no.4
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• pp.211-223
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• 2012

This study purposed to evaluate the influences of rival hospitals on the number of patients who visited the a study territory hospital. Spatial analysis technique was used to measure the impact of rival hospitals in study region. Selected hospitals were all medical school affiliated hospitals which were located in Daejeon metropolitan city and Chungchungnamdo. Patient data was collected from the claims data of the study hospital, and the number of inpatient and outpatients who visited the study hospital between January and June in 2008 were calculated on the smallest administrative district, Eup, Myeon, and Dong, in study region. To control the differences of regional characteristics among Eup, Myeon, Dong, socio-economic variables (total population, number of people aged over 65, number of basic livelihood security recipients, distance from the study hospital to the centroid point of each Eup, Myeon, Dong, number of business, and number of employees) were included in analysis model. These variables were collected from the annual year book of city as well as county located in study region. Cluster analysis classified the study region into three groups by using the difference of between th actual number of inpatient/outpatient and the predicted number of inpatient/outpatient in Eup, Myeon, and Dong. Most areas around the rivalry hospitals were categorized into same group. Multiple regression analysis indicated that areas around rivalry hospitals had statistically significantly negative relationship with the number of inpatients and outpatients who visited the study hospital. As the buffer size was increased from 5Km to 10Km, the standardized regression coefficients were decreased. These study results confirmed that rivalry hospitals in region had negative impacts on the performance of hospitals. It suggests that hospitals will require not only to select their location to minimize the effects of rivalry hospitals, but also to establish their strategy to cope with the rivalry's threats in their region.