• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.19
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• pp.8503-8508
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• 2014

Background: After the WHO recommended HPV vaccination of the general population in 2009, government support of HPV vaccination programs was increased in many countries. However, this policy was not implemented in Korea due to perceived low cost-effectiveness. Thus, the aim of this study was to analyze the cost-utility of HPV vaccination programs targeted to high risk populations as compared to vaccination programs for the general population. Materials and Methods: Each study population was set to 100,000 people in a simulation study to determine the incremental cost-utility ratio (ICUR), then standard prevalence rates, cost, vaccination rates, vaccine efficacy, and the Quality-Adjusted Life-Years (QALYs) were applied to the analysis. In addition, sensitivity analysis was performed by assuming discounted vaccination cost. Results: In the socially vulnerable population, QALYs gained through HPV vaccination were higher than that of the general population (General population: 1,019, Socially vulnerable population: 5,582). The results of ICUR showed that the cost of HPV vaccination was higher for the general population than the socially vulnerable population. (General population: 52,279,255 KRW, Socially vulnerable population: 9,547,347 KRW). Compared with 24 million KRW/QALYs as the social threshold, vaccination of the general population was not cost-effective. In contrast, vaccination of the socially vulnerable population was strongly cost-effective. Conclusions: The results suggest the importance and necessity of government support of HPV vaccination programs targeted to socially vulnerable populations because a targeted approach is much more cost-effective. The implementation of government support for such vaccination programs is a critical strategy for decreasing the burden of HPV infection in Korea.

• Research in Community and Public Health Nursing
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.271-280
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• 2019

Purpose: This study evaluates the efficacy of a Self-Care Reinforcement Program (SCRP) based on the Selection Optimization Compensation (SOC) model, in socially vulnerable elderly women with metabolic syndrome. Methods: This study adopts a pretest-posttest nonequivalent control group design. The participants were 64 socially vulnerable elderly Korean women with metabolic syndrome (experimental group: 31, control group: 33). Participants' body composition analysis, nutrient intake, risk factors of metabolic syndrome, depressive symptoms, and social network were measured. Data were analyzed with an independent t-test; statistical significance levels were set at p<.05. The SCRP, including metabolic syndrome education, nutritional education, exercise, and social network, was performed three times a week for 8 weeks. Results: There were statistically significant differences between the experimental and control groups in terms of systolic blood pressure, diastolic pressure, fasting blood sugar, triglycerides, sodium intake, depressive symptoms, and social networks. Conclusion: The SCRP is effective and can be recommended as a community health nursing intervention for socially vulnerable elderly women with metabolic syndrome.

• Journal of the Korean Society of School Health
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.181-193
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• 2017

Purpose: This is a qualitative descriptive study with the purpose of identifyng the health problems and related factors of socially vulnerable school-age children in Seoul, South Korea. Methods: Two focus group interviews and two individual interviews were conducted with eleven participants. They were two class teachers, three school nurses and two daycare teachers working at elementary schools and three social workers and a welfare worker working at community childcare centers. Data were analyzed using qualitative content analysis. Results: The identified psychosocial problems were 'distracting and excessive behavior', 'depression and helplessness,' 'aggression and violent behaviors', and 'internet overdependence'. The revealed physical health problems were 'poor hygiene', 'obesity', and 'gastrointestinal problems'. In addition, the fact that physical and psychosocial problems are closely inter-linked was reaffirmed through practical examples. Meanwhile, socioeconomic, family environmental, social experiential and individual factors were found to affect children's health. Relationships within a family or a peer group and healthy lifestyle were considered critical issues to deal with in order to improve the childrens' health status. Conclusion: It was proved that socially vulnerable school-age children have various physical and mental health problems due to multiple factors. Therefore, it is required to design nursing approaches that help them achieve optimal health status.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.12 no.7
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• pp.295-305
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• 2012

This study analyzes actual conditions of private health insurance empirically by using the decision to join Korea Health Panel data. First, the study investigates how sociodemographic factors influence joining the private health insurance. Next, the relationship between the private health insurance membership and the frequency of medical service utilization is analyzed. The main results of these analyses can be summarized as follows: the socially vulnerable are less likely to join private health insurance relative to the middle and upper classes. The frequency of medical service utilization of private insurance members is relatively higher. This fact contains the possibility that the middle and upper classes are able to receive more medical services through private health insurance membership, while the socially vulnerable have difficulty with obtaining medical services in spite of much need. Therefore, policies are needed which manage the private health insurance more effectively and secure the publicity of health service socially.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.682-689
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• 2019

This study aims to spatialize the gap between obesity levels through the body mass index, an objective indicator of the level of health among vulnerable people. Thus, areas where the BMI showed cluster patterns with spatial high and low values were extracted and the characteristics of the region were analyzed. The analysis showed that the I statistics for the obesity rate were 0.07 and the z-score was 4.39, confirming spatial autocorrelation. For z-score, it was much larger than the maximum threshold of 2.57. This means that the rate of obesity among the socially vulnerable is regional, and this gap is spatially significant. The results of comparing and analyzing the local environment for these areas of obesity and health care were found to be areas with poor public transportation, less readily available parks, and a concentration of single and multi-generation housing. The analysis results of this study are meaningful in that they provide spatial implications for the health of the socially vulnerable class that previous studies have neglected.

• Journal of the Society of Disaster Information
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.383-394
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• 2023

Purpose : This study focuses on improvements in cell broadcast service(CBS) with consideration of socially vulnerable groups, and identifies service factors necessary for elderly people in particular. Method : Multiple regression analysis was applied to test overall satisfaction with cell broadcast service as the dependent variable and each of the service factors as the independent variable. Result : The results showed that fast delivery had the greatest effect on overall satisfaction with cell broadcast service in both groups, followed by the delivery of sufficient content for the elderly group and system quality for the non-elderly group. The results demonstrated that the elderly group cared more about information content, while the non-elderly group considered functions such as system quality and text message transmission criteria more important. Conclusion : Elderly people consider the delivery of sufficient information important as well as fast delivery, which suggests that it is necessary when sending cell broadcast service to give consideration to the characteristics of elderly people, as they tend to have weaker understanding and thinking abilities than the non-elderly.

• Research in Community and Public Health Nursing
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.51-59
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• 2016

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to provide a disease management, nutrition education, and group exercise program for three months to the moderately frail elderly whose physical functions have deteriorated, and to investigate its effects in order to develop an intervention program. Methods: As a quasi-experiment, this study was conducted based on non-equivalence studies designed as a similar experiment. The milk intake group and calcium intake group participated in the disease education, individual nutrition education, and group exercise program for three months, and the control group was visited once in the three months by a nurse who provided disease education, nutrition education, and oral instruction of exercise, and asked them to exercise on their own every day. For the data analysis, ${\chi}^2$-test, ANOVA and $Scheff{\acute{e}}$ test were used. Results: After three months of intervention, there was a significant difference in the frailty level (p=.029) and bone density (p=.001) between the groups. Conclusion: The comprehensive intervention program had an effect on the bone density and the frailty level of the socially-vulnerable and moderately frail elderly, suggesting that the program can be used as a nursing intervention to prevent functional deterioration and damage of the moderately frail elderly.

• KIEAE Journal
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.43-52
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• 2016

In the 21st century, Korea had radical economic development with accelerating urban sprawl, and following declination with social polarization. City declination makes socially vulnerable people unstable and increase homelessness. The projects revitalizing decayed area utilize local idle spaces to build new facility with creative supportive programs. The purpose of this study is to analyze inclusive characteristics of a supportive housing 'The Brook'. A field visit walk through observation and in-depth interview were utilized as research methods. The information of a representative supportive housing field will promote understanding the concept, and create base for further research. As results, state and knowhow of information concerning housing first policy, active government investment, space planning, management, social integration, service providing, architecture and so on offered to facilitate inclusive insights. In conclusion, the characteristics of supportive housing were realistically analyzed through a field research. This research is significant to introduce initially the effective supportive housing which has been practiced for 30 years in USA to that needs alternatives for the socially vulnerable in Korea.

• Journal of the Korean housing association
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.33-44
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• 2015

The fast and competitive urbanization has accelerated unbalanced land utilization and housing, thereby producing large number of decaying areas and socially disadvantaged population, while generally promoted citizen's quality of life. Since rental housing policy, therefore, has emerged as a major important issue to solve these ever increasing problems, new concepts in leading examples need to be explored to stimulate creative ideas for future housing improvement. The purpose of this research is to extract successful factors of a leading rental housing 'Manhattan Plaza' in New York city, expecting useful implications for housing improvement in Korea. Field visit and in-depth interview for data collection and qualitative approach for analysis were carried out. As results, its successful sustainability and fame were found to be attributable to following concepts, such as, socially integrative mix of diverse residents, residents' participation in management, privacy respect administration, considerate planning and design features of physical environment. The latter, especially, were prominent in peripheral spaces, indoor and outdoor community spaces, and private spaces. Based on the results, suggestions were made for future Korean rental housing development.

• Journal of the Korean Regional Science Association
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• v.35 no.4
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• pp.61-73
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• 2019

Urban development and densification have led to the Urban Heat Island Effect, in which the temperature of urban space is higher than the surrounding areas, and the intensity is increasing with climate change. In addition, when the city's air temperature rises in summer, low-income, elderly population, and socially vulnerable people who have health problems lack the ability to cope with the elevated heat environment. Therefore, this study aimed to identify the urban heat island area of Seoul through Hotspot analysis, which is a spatial statistics technique, and explored physical environments, demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of urban heat island effect areas using logistic regression models. This study performed urban heat island hotspot analysis using the average air temperatures of the 423 administrative dongs in Seoul. Analysis results identified that the urban heat islands were concentrated in Jung-gu, Jongno-gu, Yongsan-gu, and Yeongdeungpo-gu. Logistic regression analysis results indicated that urban heat island areas of Seoul were affected by residential floor area ratio, commercial facility floor area ratio, overall floor area ratio, impervious surface ratio, and normalized difference vegetation index(NDVI). In addition, as a result of analyzing the vulnerable area of thermal environment considering the demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of the heat island area, urban heat island areas of Seoul were significantly associated with the proportion of low-income elderly living alone. The result of this study provided useful insights for urban thermal environmental design and policy development that could improve the thermal environment for the socially disadvantaged urban population.