• Integrative Medicine Research
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.95-102
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• 2018

Background: Hypertension is a major cause of cardiovascular disease and associated mortality, and postmenopausal women are at a high risk of hypertension. We aim to investigate the hypotensive effect and safety of acupuncture, focusing on postmenopausal women with prehypertension and stage 1 hypertension. In addition, we aim to investigate whether the effect of acupuncture treatment differed, depending on Sasang Constitution and cold-heat pattern. Methods: This study is designed as an intervention cohort study. Two hundred postmenopausal women aged <65 years with prehypertension or stage 1 hypertension living in Daejeon city in Korea will be recruited, and randomly assigned to either an acupuncture or no-treatment control group. The intervention will consist of four sessions; one session will include acupuncture performed 10 times for 4 weeks. There will be a 20-week observation period after each session, and the total study duration will be 96 weeks. Acupuncture will be applied at the bilateral Fengchi (GB20), Quchi (LI11), Zusanli (ST36), and Sameumgyo (SP6) acupoints. The effect of acupuncture will be evaluated by comparing the change in systolic and diastolic blood pressure between the acupuncture and control groups every 4 weeks until the end of the study. Discussion: To evaluate the success of blood pressure management, long-term observation is required, but no long-term studies have been conducted to evaluate the effect of acupuncture on blood pressure in postmenopausal women. To our knowledge, this study will be the first long-term study to investigate this issue for more than 6-8 weeks.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.589-594
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• 2013

Background: Prospective cohort studies to determine cofactors with oncogenic HPV-infections for cervical cancer are very rare from developing countries and such data are limited to the few screening trials. Large screening trials provide such data as a by product. Some of the cases are prevented by screening and do not surface as invasive cancers at all. Also, pre-invasive lesions are detected almost entirely by screening. Screening causes selection bias if attendance in or effectiveness of screening is correlated with the risk factors. The aim of this study was to quantify the influence of screening on risk factors for cervical cancer. Materials and Methods: Our material stems from a rural cohort of 80,000 women subjected to a randomised screening trial. The effect of screening on the incidence of cervix cancer was estimated with reference to socio-demographic and reproductive risk factors of cervical cancer. We compared these risks with the incidence of cancer in the randomised control population by the same determinants of risk. Results: The results in the screening arm compared to the control arm showed that the women of low SES and young age were benefitting more than those of high SES and old age. The relative risk by age (30-39 vs 50-59) was 0.33 in the control arm and 0.24 in the screening arm. The relative risk by education (not educated vs educated) was 2.8 in the control arm and 1.8 in the screening arm. The previously married women did not benefit (incidence 113 and 115 per 100,000 women years in control vs screening arms) whereas the effect was substantial in those married (86 vs 54). Conclusions: The results in controls were consistent with the general evidence, but results in attenders and nonattenders of the screening arm showed that screening itself and self-selection in attendance and effectiveness can influence the effect estimates of risk factors. The effect of cervical cancer screening programmes on the estimates of incidence of cervical cancer causes bias in the studies on etiology and, therefore, they should be interpreted with caution.

• The Korean Journal of Applied Statistics
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.427-446
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• 2018

Korea will have a super-aged society within only 30 years according to the United Nations' definition of an aging society and the statistics on Korea's Population projections (2016), indicates that Korea has the fastest ageing speed in the world. There is a lack of data on long-term time-series data on death as related to pension and welfare policies compared to the rapid rate of aging. This paper estimates life expectancy over 245 years (from 1955 to 2200) through past and future forecasts as well as compares the expected life expectancy of the synthetic cohort and the real cohort. In addition, an international comparisons were made to understand the level of aging in Korea. Estimates of the back-projection period were compared with previous studies and the LC model to improve accuracy and objectivity. In addition, the predictions after 2016 reflected the declined mortality rate effect of Korea using the LC-ER model. The results showed an increase in life expectancy of about 30 years over 60 years (1955-2015) with an expected life expectancy of the real cohort over the second century (1955-2155) higher than the synthetic cohort. The comparative advantage of life expectancy of real cohorts was confirmed to be a common trend among comparative countries. In addition, Japan and Korea have a higher life expectancy and starting from 85 to 90 years old, all comparative countries show that the growth rate for the life expectancy of synthetic and real cohorts is less than previous years.

• The Korean Journal of Applied Statistics
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• v.26 no.6
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• pp.1019-1032
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• 2013

The accurate prediction of future mortality is an important issue due to recent rapid increases in life expectancy. An accurate estimation and prediction of mortality is important to future welfare policies. The optimal selection of a mortality model is important to estimate and predict mortality; however, the period of time series data used is also an important issue. It is essential to understand that the time series data for mortality is short in Korea and the data before 1982 is incomplete. This paper divides the time series of Korean mortality into two sets to compare the parameter estimates of the LC model and LC model with a cohort effect by the period of data used. A modeling and prediction of the mortality index and cohort effect index as well as the evaluation of future life expectancy is conducted. Finally, some suggestions are proposed for the future prediction of mortality.

• Journal of the Korean Data and Information Science Society
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• v.25 no.5
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• pp.987-998
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• 2014

The primary purpose of this paper is to derive a benchmark dose lower limit (BMDL) of lead for the attention deficit/hyperactive disorder (ADHD) based on a longitudinal cohort data set which is referred to as CHEER data set. The CHEER data were recently recruited from the Ministry of Environment of S. Korea to investigate the effect of environment on children's health We first confirm the correlation of ADHD with the blood lead level using a linear mixed effect model. We report from the longitudinal characteristic of CHEER data that ADHD scores tend to have "regression to the mean". A dose-response curve of blood lead level with ADHD being the end point is derived and from this dose-response curve a few BMDLs are derived based on corresponding assumptions on the benchmark region.

• The Korean Journal of Applied Statistics
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.13-28
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• 2018

The ministry of Environment of Korea initiated two follow-up surveys in 2005 and 2006 to investigate environmental effect on children's health. These two cohorts, referred to as the 2005 Cohort and 2006 Cohort, were followed up three times every two years. This data set was referred to as the Children's Health and Environmental Research (CHEER) data set. This paper reproduces the existing research results of Kim et al. (Journal of the Korean Data and Information Science Society, 25, 987-998, 2014) and Lee et al. (The Korean Journal of Applied Statistics, 29, 1295-1310, 2016) and derive a benchmark dose lower limit (BMDL) for blood lead level for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) after pooling two cohort data sets. The different ADHD rating scales were unified by applying the conversion formula proposed by Lee et al. (2016). The random effect model and AR(1) model were built to reflect the longitudinal characteristics and regression to the mean phenomenon. Based on these models the BMDLs for blood lead levels were derived using the BMDL formula and the simulation. We obtained a hight level of BMDLs when we pooled two independent cohort data sets.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.45-65
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• 2009

As a number of people using the internet for their shopping steadily rises, it is increasingly important for retailers to understand why consumers decide to buy products via online or offline. The main purpose of this study is to develop and test a model that enhance our understanding of how consumers respond future online and offline channels for their purchasing. Rather than merely adopting statistical models like most other studies in this field, the present study develops a model that combines double-cohort method with multinomial logit model. It is desirable if one can adopt an overall encompassing criterion in the study of consumer behaviors form diverse sales channels. This study uses the concept of cohort or aging to enable this comparison. It enables us to analyze how consumers respond to online and offline channels as people aged by measuring their shopping behavior for an online and offline retailers and their subsequent purchase intentions. Based on some empirical findings, this study concludes with policy implications and some necessary fields of future studies desirable.

• Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.207-211
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• 2008

We investigated the leaf demography of a temperate woody liana, Akebia trifoliata, in a temperate forest in Japan, Akebia is semi-evergreen: some leaves are shed before winter, while others remain through the winter. Previous studies of semi-evergreen species found that variation in leaf life span was caused by variation in the timing of leaf emergence, Leaves that appeared just before winter over-wintered, while leaves appearing earlier were shed, However, it is unclear whether leaves of the same cohort (i.e., leaves that appear at the same time within a single site) show variation in life span under the effect of strong seasonality. To separate variation in life span among the leaves in each cohort from variation among cohorts, we propose a new method - the single leaf diagram, which shows the emergence and death of each leaf. Using single leaf diagrams, our study revealed that Akebia leaves within a cohort showed substantial variation in life span, with some over-wintering and some not. In addition, leaves on small ramets in the understory showed great variation in life span, while leaves on large ramets, which typically reach higher positions in the forest canopy, have shorter lives, As a result, small ramets were semi-evergreen, whereas large ramets were deciduous, The longer lives of leaves on small ramets can be interpreted as a shade-adaptive strategy in understory plants.

• Journal of Ginseng Research
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.158-164
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• 2003

Recently, there are much concerns about ginseng as disease therapeutics. There are no epidemiologic study on relationship between ginseng intake and all cause mortality based from general population Cohort. This study sought to examine relationships between ginseng intake and all cause mortality from Kangwha Cohort data. From March 1985 through December 1999, 2696 males and 3595 females who were aged 55 or over as of 1985 were followed up. We calculate the mortality rate, standardized mortality ratio and risk ratios by ginseng intake. Cox proportional hazard model was used to adjust various confounding factors. Ginseng intake group had the lower all cause mortality(Risk ratio(RR)=0.88, 95%Confidence Interval(CI)=0.79-0.97) among males. Increasing ginseng intake, lower all cause mortality(Low ginseng intake: RR=0.88, 95%CI=0.79-0.98; high ginseng intake : RR=0.87, 95%CI=0.75-1.00) among males. There is no statistically significant difference between ginseng intake and mortality among females. The results of this study suggests that ginseng intake may prolong the human life among males.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Food Culture
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.118-127
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• 2004

The purpose of this study was to identify the preferred types and consumption patterns of food away from home by socio-demographic factors including cohort groups, sex. and consumption patterns consisting of 6 types. Data were collected from 412 respondents by questionnaire method in April through May 2002. Regression results indicate that sex, age, family income, family type and size as well as the consumption patterns were significant in explaining the determinants of food away from home expenditures. Four logit function (each for Korean, American, Japanese, and bunsik) results showed that each type of food away from home was likely to vary depending on socio-demographic factors (i.e., cohort groups and sex) and the consumption patterns (i.e., convenience and simple, distinction and variety, tradition oriented, foreign design, health and quality oriented, sensible taste and mood). Similarities and differences in food away from home types are discussed, and future implications for food and nutrition specialists as well as food industrial marketers are provided.