• Korean Journal of Biological Psychiatry
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.28-35
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• 2014

Objectives This study aimed to identify the relationship between quality of life (QoL) and psychosocial factors of schizophrenia patients registered in a community mental health center. Methods The ninety patients with schizophrenia, diagnosed by Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-Fourth Edition-Text Revision, registered in a community mental health center were studied cross-sectionally. Four trained personnels interviewed each subject individually for the assessment of QoL, psychopathology, severity of depressed mood, insight of illness, attitude toward drugs, social function, degree of social supports and conflicts. Results QoL was significantly related to the psychopathology, depressed mood, social conflict, social support; and other aspects of QoL were slightly differently related to depressed mood, social conflict, social support and attitude toward drug by scales. In multiple regression analysis, depressed mood (20.0%) and social conflict (10.3%) were contributed to QoL assessed by Korean version of 4th revision of Schizophrenia Quality of Life. Social support (21.4%), social conflict (20.9%) and depressed mood (3.1%) were contributed to QoL assessed by Korean modification of the Scale to measure Subjective Well-being under Neuroleptic treatment. Conclusions These findings demonstrated that QoL of schizophrenia patients in a community is affected by depressed mood, social support and conflict rather than psychotic symptoms, insight and attitude toward drugs. And this result suggests the necessity of approaching not only to the psychotic symptoms but also to the psychosocial characteristics in caring schizophrenia patients in the community.

• Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.33-39
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• 2018

Purpose: This study aimed to identify how an education program on palliative care affects nursing home caregivers' perception of hospice care and attitude towards terminally ill patient care. Methods: This study was conducted using a nonequivalent control group with a pretest-posttest design. The participants were 101 certified care workers: 58 in the experimental group and 43 in the control. The experimental group completed the palliative care education program consisted of 20 hours of classroom training and 20 hours of clinical practicum. An ANCOVA was performed to compare the score changes to outcome variables. Results: Compared with the control group, the experimental group showed significant pretest-posttest differences in both the perception of hospice care (F=21.09, P<0.001) and attitude towards caring for terminally ill patients (F=13.28, P<0.001). Conclusion: These results indicate that the palliative care education program for caregivers is effective in preparing participants to provide hospice/palliative care service. Further study is warranted to explore the effects of this program on palliative caregivers' performance.

• Women's Health Nursing
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.134-144
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• 2022

Purpose: A descriptive correlational survey was conducted to examine nurses' attitudes and stress related to perinatal bereavement care (PBC) and their relationships, with the ultimate goal of improving nurses' capabilities related to PBC. Methods: Korean nurses (N=136) who had experienced perinatal death at least once were recruited from seven hospitals. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. The Korean version of Nurses' Attitudes towards Perinatal Bereavement Support was assessed in terms of three subdomains (attitudes to PBC, importance of policies related to PBC, and importance of training related to PBC), and nurses' stress was measured. Results: The participants gave high scores for the attitude-related items of "giving sufficient time to bereaved parents to mourn for their dead baby" (4.54 points) and "nurses should treat bereaved parents with respect and dignity" (4.51 points), and they perceived a high level of importance for the policy-related items of "every staff member in the hospital should understand the policies relevant for PBC" and "when nurses feel emotional exhaustion, they should seek support" (4.58 points). Nurses' attitude toward PBC was associated with the perceived importance of policies (r=.40, p<.001), the perceived importance of PBC-related training (r=.61, p<.001), and stress related to PBC (r=.29, p<.001). Nurses' perceived importance of PBC-related training was associated with stress related to PBC (r=.38, p<.001). Conclusion: Establishing hospital policies related to PBC and providing PBC training for nurses could positively affect nurses' attitudes toward PBC. A stress management program for nurses could reduce the stress caused by PBC.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
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• v.67 no.3
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• pp.227-252
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• 2015

This study conducted in-depth interviews of seven parents with autistic adults and analyzed them using qualitative case study methods in order to understand overall meaning of care experiences of parents with autistic adult children. Thus, four key topics which are 'experience of embracement', 'experience of anticipation', 'experience of despair', 'experience of resistance' were constructed. Under these key topics, 12 subcategories which are 'accepting reality', 'positive experience', 'gradual improvement', 'desire to provide better quality of life', 'expectation towards the society', 'strenuous lives', 'psychological exhaustion', 'predicted anxiety', 'defensive attitude', 'distrust of social welfare', 'confronting injustice', 'active behaviors' were constructed. According to the analysis, care experiences of parents with autistic adults are not segmentary, but they are intertwined which make them more dynamic. Thus, easing their despair, empowering positiveness to them, and assisting them to have healthy resistant voice are needed to support the parents with autistic adults. Based on the analysis, we suggest an intervention plan to support autistic adults and their parents.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.19 no.6
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• pp.334-344
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• 2018

This study was conducted to identify the relationship between knowledge, attitude, and compliance regarding infection preventive behaviors among long-term care hospital staff during a Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) epidemic. The subjects were 211 staff members of a long-term care hospital in J province evaluated using a structured survey. Data were collected between June 15 and July 15, 2015 and analyzed using SPSS/WIN 24.0 based on an independent t-test, ANOVA, and Welch test, while post-hoc tests were conducted using the Scheffe test and the Grames-Hawell test. The MERS knowledge score of the staff at the long-term care hospital was high for nurses and nurse aids, who had experienced infection management when they received influenza vaccine in the previous year and were provided with easy access to hand sanitizers. Attitude towards MERS was more positive for nurses than nurse aids and caregivers. The degree of execution of infection preventive behaviors in terms of daily activity was high when influenza shots were received in the prior year; in terms of caring for patients, it was high when influenza shots were received in the previous year and they had easy access to hand sanitizers. The relationship between knowledge, attitude, and infection preventive behavior regarding MERS was such that high knowledge and positive attitude led to a higher degree of execution of infection preventive behavior. Therefore, during periods of high prevalence of newly infectious diseases such as MERS, it is important for the long-term care hospitals to conduct infection management education including the characteristics of the MERS disease, its transmission, and its prevention to enhance knowledge regarding MERS and induce positive change in attitude to improve the level of infection preventive behaviors.

• Quality Improvement in Health Care
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.190-202
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• 2000

Background : The objectives of this study were to examine patients' satisfaction with the DRG based payment method and its association with their awareness of the method, to examine patient reported changes in doctors' caring attitude, level of their out-of-pocket payments, providers' acceptance of patients' request for additional services after the program, and to examine changes in service utilization recorded in medical records. Method : One hundred-four patients who had cesarean sections before and after the demonstration program at two hospitals located in Seoul participated in the study. Patients were surveyed before discharges when their charges were finalized. Their medical records were reviewed as well to collect data for service utilization during hospital stays. The association between patients' satisfaction with the payment method and their awareness of the method was analyzed by ${\chi}^2$-test, and the significance of changes in providers' acceptance of patients' request for additional services and service utilization after the program were examined by ${\chi}^2$-test and t-test, respectively. Results : A large proportion of patients did not know of the DRG based payment method at the time of survey and a significantly larger proportion of patients who came to the hospitals with the knowledge satisfied with the method. About the same proportion of patients reported improvement and deterioration in doctors' caring attitude compare to the previous hospitalizations and a similar result was found concerning out-of-pocket payments. Providers' acceptance of patients' request for medication, PCA and painless delivery decreased significantly after the program whereas the acceptance for additional hospital days and laboratory and radiology tests did not. Length of stay, the numbers of days on antibiotics and antianemic medication, and the number of blood tests decreased significantly after the program, however, decreases in the rate of antianemic medication and the number of urine analyses were not statistically significant. Re-operation, in-hospital death, and complications were not observed before and after the program. Conclusion : The study findings indicated a need for better patient education and publicity about the newly introduced payment method to improve their satisfaction with the system. Other study findings concerning service utilization and quality of care indicators were consistent with the government funded evaluation studies.

• The Korean Journal of Community Living Science
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.223-234
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• 2008

This study aimed to develop the elderly care program for seniors in rural areas and to evaluate its efficacy through pre- and post-tests. For them, this study carried out a total of 8 sessions that includes 4 aims, such as understanding rural elderly, volunteer activities, psychological help, and aids to daily living, on 36 persons over the age of 60 years in rural areas. The data was analyzed by paired t-test to 36 elderly. The results of the study are as follows. First, looking at changes in knowledge about aging, objective evaluation of knowledge showed significant differences (t=-2.22, p<.05), but evaluation of elderly's perception-change didn't show significant differences between before and after. Second, volunteer attitude didn't show significant differences between before and after, but after the training, 75% of them answered 'yes' to question that asked whether they'd like to participate in elderly's volunteer caring activity for other elderly within the town in the future, which gave us certain expectation that the attitude towards volunteer activities might change positively in the future. Third, objective evaluation of knowledge for psychological help didn't show significant differences between before and after. But elderly's subjective perception showed significant differences (t=-2.82, p<.01). Fourth, evaluating changes in knowledge for elderly's aiding daily life, both the objective evaluation and subjective evaluation didn't show significant differences between before and after. Fifth, satisfaction of the program showed high scores over 4 points: contents, education methods, education place, education time. The most helpful topics for them were counseling (27.8%) and dementia (27.8%), followed by elderly and aging (16.7%), elderly's residential environment (13.9%), elderly's dietary life (9.3%) and volunteer activities (5.6%).

• Korean Journal of Child Studies
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• v.3
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• pp.1-15
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• 1982

I. Objectives This study was done to analyze and evaluate the attitudes of the working mothers toward the care of infants in group settings. II. Method and Procedures 1. Standardized questionnaire were sent out to look into the following: 1) the attitude of working mothers, who have infants below 4 years of age, regarding their job, care-taker and group settings. 2) the status of taking care of their infants 2. Subjects Women teachers of Seoul and Kyung Ki primary school districts, who have infants below age 4. The selection of these subjects were done by random sampling. III. Results 1. Attitudes regarding their jobs: The first reason for retaining their jobs are for financial reasons; whereas, their intents of self-actualization and contributions to society comes next. 2. The Status of Caretakers 60.7% of the care-takers are family-related members, and 38.3% are not. The educational level of caretakers are as follows, with 19.6% of the caretakers without any formal education, 44% with primary education, and 18.7% having high school education. The reasons for the dissatisfaction by the caretakers are low education, a frequent change of caretaker, and an attitude without affection. The cost of child caring is high, the main reason being the heavy expense spent on the caretakers. 3. Attitudes of care in group settings: 85.9% of the subjects responded with positive reactions for the necessity of having group-settings. The reasons given for the importance of having a group setting are early experience, social interaction with peer group and educational functioning, in addition to protective care. They desire for a family-style care which can raise infants under high quality of care.

• Journal of Families and Better Life
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.83-104
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• 2015

The purpose of this study is to provide diverse points of view to understand the low fertility issue of Korean society. For this phenomenological qualitative study, in-depth interviews were conducted with 14 married couples(28 persons) all raising three children. Participants were asked about overall family and work life, child care role performance, thoughts about child rearing, and their sociocultural context. Interview data were explored based on 6 analyzing steps offered by S, J, Talyor and R. Bogdan(1984). Most participants of this study were formed positive perceptions about having three children. Parents' positive perception was closely related with their attitude of not worrying too much about their children's future as well as child caring contexts around them. Parents' perception about having three children was also linked with their child care role construction process. In detail, parents with more positive perceptions tended to increase their level of child care involvement. This was particularly true for fathers. Mother and father's job situation emerged as an important factor to shape their child care involvement. In addition, child care attitude of people around them explained father's child care involvement. Applying these qualitative results, we first expect to provide detailed ideas about lives with three children in Korea. Second, based on our study findings, a more realistic and helpful policy to help the low fertility problem could be developed. Lastly, we also hope to provide helpful phenomenological qualitative research about low fertility issues of Korea.

• Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.136-144
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• 2016

Purpose: To provide practical data for bioethics education, we identified correlations between recognition of good death, attitude towards withdrawal of meaningless life-sustaining treatment, and attitude towards euthanasia in nurses. Methods: Using convenience sampling, we recruited 218 nurses who had at least six-month work experience in one of the six general hospitals with 500 or more beds in Seoul, Busan, and Gyeongsang province. All participants understood the purpose of the study and agreed to take part in the study. The research tools used included the Concept of Good Death Measure (CoGD), the measurement tool for attitudes towards withdrawal of meaningless life-sustaining treatment (WoMLST), and the measurement tool for attitudes towards euthanasia. Data were analyzed using an Independent t-test, one-way ANOVA, and Pearson's correlation coefficient using SPSS 21 for Windows. Results: Nurses had normal levels on CoGD, WoMLST, and attitudes towards euthanasia. Nurses' CoGD, WoMLST, and euthanasia scores significantly differed depending on their education level, working period, and the importance of religion to them. A negative correlation was found between the CoGD and WoMLST scores, and WoMLST and euthanasia scores were positively correlated. Conclusion: Nurses should be trained to deal with ethical issues that may arise while caring for terminal patients. It is necessary for nurses to understand the concepts related to CoGD, WoMLST, and euthanasia, and to promote bioethics education with focus on decision-making and problem-solving ability in ethically conflicting situations.