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Patient and Clinical Variables Account for Changes in Health-related Quality of Life and Symptom Burden as Treatment Outcomes in Colorectal Cancer: A Longitudinal Study

  • Hung, Hsiu-Chi;Chien, Tsui-Wei;Tsay, Shiow-Luan;Hang, Hewi-Ming;Liang, Shu-Yuan
    • Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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    • v.14 no.3
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    • pp.1905-1909
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    • 2013
  • Objective: The aim of the current study was to evaluate changes in treatment outcomes in terms of health-related quality of life (HRQoL) and symptom burden at zero, one, three, and six months after an initial diagnosis of colorectal cancer. The demographic and clinical characteristics that account for outcome changes in patients were investigated using a repeated measures framework. Methods and Materials: A cohort study was performed of 134 colorectal cancer patients followed from diagnosis to 6 months post-treatment in Central Taiwan. HRQoL and symptoms were assessed at diagnosis and one, three, and six months thereafter. The Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-Colon (FACT-C) questionnaire, VAS pain, and the Memorial Symptom Assessment Scale (MSAS) were used for data collection. A generalized estimating equation (GEE) was applied for statistical analysis. Results: The majority of the patients were male (55%) and married (91.5%). The mean age was 60.4 years (SD = 11.71). Most were diagnosed stage III and IV colorectal cancer (54.5%). All underwent surgery; some also received chemotherapy (CT) or concurrent chemoradiation therapy (CCRT). The results of the GEE showed that overall, the HRQoL, pain, and symptoms of the patients significantly improved over the treatment period. Patients with stage IV disease who had received surgery and CCRT showed the worst HRQoL. Females, patients with comorbidity, and stage IV patients had higher pain scores over time. Female and stage IV patients had more severe physical symptoms, whereas stage II and IV patients had worse psychological symptoms over time. Conclusion: The patients' HRQoL, pain, and symptoms significantly improved over the 6-month treatment period. Certain patient and clinical variables accounted for changes in treatment outcomes regarding HRQoL and symptom burden in colorectal cancer patients.

New Design Method for Pile Group Under Vertical Load (연직하중을 받는 무리말뚝의 새로운 설계 방법)

  • 이수형;정충기
    • Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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    • v.19 no.1
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    • pp.31-40
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    • 2003
  • Current design of pile group is based on the estimation of the overall bearing capacity of a pile group from that of a single pile using a group efficiency. However, the behaviors of a pile group are influenced by various factors such as the method of pile installation, pile-soil-pile interaction, cap-soil-pile interaction, etc. Thus, it is practically impossible to take into account these factors reasonably with the only group efficiency. In this paper, a new method for the design of pile groups is proposed, where the significant factors affecting the behavior of a pile group are considered separately by adopting several efficiencies. Furthermore, in the proposed method, the load transfer characteristics of piles and the difference of pile behaviors with respect to the pile locations in group can be taken into account. The efficiencies for the method are determined using the settlement failure criterion, which is consistent with the concept of allowable settlement fur structures. The efficiencies calculated from the results of existing model tests are presented, and the bearing capacity of a pile group in the other model test is calculated and compared with that from the test result to verify the validity of the proposed method.

A Study on Grading Practices of Men's Pants in Apparel Industry (기성복 남자 바지 패턴 그레이딩에 관한 연구 -35-55세를 중심으로-)

  • Kyung, Yoon-Mi
    • Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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    • v.13 no.6
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    • pp.934-942
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    • 2011
  • This study was intended to analyze conventional grading increments and methods for middle-age men's pants, and to suggest new grading guidelines that will enable to improve satisfaction with size and silhouette as a result of combining the concept of grading, which help maintain the ratio and proportion by sizes as one of ready-made apparel's advantages, with body form oriented and aesthetic approaches. In the apparel industry, the current sizing specifications and methods adopted by relevant companies, as well as the characteristics of body forms of men aged 35 to 55 years were comparatively analyzed to find out problems and ultimately to suggest their solutions or improvements. It was considered that as the conventional grading practices used in the industry were customary on the basis of the past experiences, it was required to take the body forms of target consumers into account and also, to reconsider the conventional grading methods. Analyses of sizing and specifications by brands show that 4 to 19 sizes including 82 or 84 as standard size have been produced. Since men's apparel has a large number of sizes with the large range of sizes, grading is critically important. As silhouettes depend on the distribution of grading rule values at each point of increment pattern in the main regions during grading, it is necessary to consider both size grading and form variations. To maintain an appropriate silhouette with keeping the angle of center back line of a pattern, it is desirable to set the ratio of side line part to center part from the crease line to approximately 3:7. It is required to diversify the values of grading rules according to different sizes and pattern regions in consideration for the body forms of key consumers. In addition, if the natural lines of designs and patterns for the width increments of waist circumference and hip circumference, the increments of hip width in pant's front and back panels, the ratio of grading rule values of the right and left sides of crease line, knee circumference, thigh circumference and so on are taken into account, grading will be satisfactory in the all aspects of size, silhouette and ratio.

Seismic Responses of Wall-Slab Apartment Building Structures Built on the Soft Soil Layer Considering the Stiffnesses of a Foundation-Soil System (연약지반의 기초지반강성을 고려한 벽식구조 아파트의 지진응답)

  • 김지원;김용석
    • Journal of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea
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    • v.5 no.3
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    • pp.19-27
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    • 2001
  • In this seismic analyses of structures, it is well recognized that the effects of soil-structure interaction can not be ignored and seismic responses of a structure taking into account the stiffnesses of a foundation-soil system show the significant difference from those with a rigid base. However, current seismic analyses of apartment building structures were carried out with the rigid base ignoring the characteristics of the foundation and the properties of the underlying soil. In this study, seismic analyses of wall-slob type apartment buildings which have a particular structural type were carried out taking into account the soft soil layer comparing seismic response spectra of a flexible base with those of a rigid base and UBC-97. Low-rise or middle height wall-slab type apartment buildings built on the deep soft soil layer showed a rigid body motion with the reduced seismic responses due to the base isolation effect, indicating that it is considerably safe but uneconomical to utilize the design spectra of UB-97 for the seismic design of wall-slab type apartment buildings due to conservative design.

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A Study on Disease, Self-Esteem, Social Support and Health Management Behavior in Blind & Visually Handicapped Students (시각장애 학생들의 원인질환 및 사회적 지위, 자아존중감, 건강관리 행위에 관한 연구)

  • Park, Mi Ri
    • Journal of the Korean Society of School Health
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    • v.10 no.1
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    • pp.75-86
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    • 1997
  • Blindness or visually handicaps are found to be an important factor destroying lifestyles as well as a physical problem. According to the data of handicapped person's(v.h.p) registered in Korea, the number of v.h.p. has not decreased. Especially, visual handicapped adolescents (v.h.a.) suffer from an insufficiency of social support under the current education system. There is a special education system for v.h.a. in Korea, and, as a result v.h.a.'s are educated separately from general students and communites. Compared with the self-conception of general students, v.h.a.'s have a more negative self-conception. Among former studies 51.7% of v.h.p's are not in good health. This, of course, means that their handicap impacts on other health problems. The first purpose of this study is to find out the causes of disease and the degree of social support, self-esteem, health management behavior provided and then to analyze the effect of self-esteem and social support on their behavior. To accomplish these purposes, visually handicapped the middle and high school students in Seoul city and Kyung-gi province were selected and 300 students sampled. The main results are as follows : 1) The highest specific handicap is impaired lenses (19.7%). 2. There were high correlations between health management behavior, self-esteem, and social support. 3. Social support is a more important variable than self-esteem on health management behavior. 4. Age of entry and length of stay in their special dormitories, and teacher's support account for 16% of psychological health management behavior 5. Age of entry in their special dormitory and total degree of social support account for 12% of preventive health behavior.

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Estimating Habitat Carrying Capacity of Shorebirds in the Intertidal Mudflat (조간대 갯벌에서의 도요·물떼새 서식지수용능력 추정)

  • Moon, Young-Min;Kim, Kwanmok;Yoo, Jeong-Chil
    • Ocean and Polar Research
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    • v.42 no.1
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    • pp.21-31
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    • 2020
  • Shorebirds migrating along the East Asian-Australasian Flyway (EAAF) have been drastically decreasing due to continuous area loss and quality degradation of intertidal mudflats in the Yellow Sea. Evaluating the current habitat quality by means of habitat carrying capacity estimation could be effective in predicting the magnitude of impacts caused by habitat loss and provide better understanding to improve management strategies. In this study, we estimated the total biomass of Macrophthalmus japonicus, a main prey item of curlews in the Korea peninsular as habitat carrying capacity of the southern intertidal mudflat of Ganghwa Island, one of the key stopover sites for curlews in the EAAF. The result of the estimation took into account spatial differences of prey biomass and the available foraging time by tide patterns. Accordingly, it was found that curlew populations account for 30.26% of the habitat carrying capacity. When we calculated the mean biomass of the area and extrapolated it to the whole area to calculate the total biomass, it was found that the curlews have consumed 10.92% of the total biomass. The results show that the habitat carrying capacity of the southern intertidal mudflat of Ganghwa Island has decreased by 7.8% compared to a study conducted twenty years ago employing the same method. This study shows that there can be considerable differences in the results of habitat carrying capacity estimation between different methods, indicating that various environmental factors that affect the estimation results of habitat carrying capacity must be considered to achieve a more precise analysis and assessment.

Improvement Measures for the Defect Determination and the Application of Repair Method for Interlayer Cracks in Apartment Houses (공동주택 층간균열의 하자판정 및 보수공법 적용에 대한 개선방안)

  • Choi, Sangjin;Shin, Manjoong
    • Korean Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
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    • v.23 no.5
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    • pp.23-33
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    • 2022
  • Cracks, which account for the largest proportion of defect lawsuits in apartment buildings, are not clear on the criteria for defect determination, so judgments about defects are mixed. Interlayer cracks, which account for most of the crack defect judgment amount, tend to be judged as defects regardless of the crack width or condition, and repair methods are mostly set uniformly. This starts from the problem that the standards of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport and the Construction Appraisal Practice, which the courts use as standards, do not match. It is necessary to establish a defect determination standard that can be applied to all stakeholders through the amendment of laws and the revision of the Court Appraisal Practice. In addition, it is necessary to apply the crack repair method according to the width and condition of the interlayer crack. If the defect determination and the application of the repair method for cracks are rationalized, it could serve as an opportunity to change the current trend of defect disputes that rely only on litigation.

Design Thermal Loads In Composite Box Girder Bridges (합성형교량의 설계온도하중)

  • Chang, Sung Pil;Im, Chang Kyun
    • Journal of Korean Society of Steel Construction
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    • v.10 no.3 s.36
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    • pp.537-551
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    • 1998
  • The intention of this paper is to provide realistic values of design thermal loads applicable to composite box girder bridges on the basis of the statistical analysis of long-term measured temperature data. For this purpose, temperatures were recorded at a newly constructed composite box girder bridge during about 20 months. Before analyzing the extreme values, major thermal loading parameters that characterize the temperature profile are defined, and a seasonal behavior of those is examined in detail. The limit distributions of the thermal loading parameters are then determined by the tail-equivalence method, and the thermal loading parameters corresponding to selected return period are calculated. Finally, the results are compared to the specifications suggested in a current design code for thermal loads, and it is concluded that the current design code is unsuitable for representing the self-equilibrated thermal stresses in composite bridges, and the horizontal temperature difference which is not suggested in current design code should be taken Into account in particular cases.

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Three-Dimensional Magnetotelluric Modeling Using Integral Equations (적분방정식을 이용한 3차원 지자기 지전류 모델링)

  • Kim, Hee Joon;Lee, Dong Sung
    • Economic and Environmental Geology
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    • v.27 no.2
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    • pp.191-199
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    • 1994
  • We have developed an algorithm based on the method of integral equations to simulate the magnetotelluric (MT) responses of three-dimensional (3-D) bodies in a layered half-space. The inhomogeneities are divided into a number of cells and are replaced by an equivalent current distribution which is approximated by pulse basis functions. A matrix equation is constructed using the electric Green's tensor function appropriate to a layered earth, and is solved for the vector current in each cell. Subsequently, scattered fields are found by integrating electric and magnetic Green's tensor functions over the scattering current About a 3-D conductive body near the earth's surface, interpretation using 2-D transverse electric modeling schemes can imply highly erratic low resistivities at depth. This is why these routines do not account for the effect of boundary charges. However, centrally located profiles across elongate 3-D prisms may be modeled accurately with a 2-D transverse magnetic algorithm, which implicitly includes boundary charges in its formulation. Multifrequency calculations show that apparent resistivity and impedance phase are really two complementary parameters. Hence, they should be treated simultaneously in broadband MT interpretation.

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Enhancement of Photovoltaic Performance of Fluorescence Materials added TiO2 electrode in Dye-sensitized Solar Cells (형광물질을 이용한 염료감응태양전지의 효율향상)

  • Cheon, JongHun;Lee, JeongGwan;Jung, MiRan;Kim, JaeHong
    • 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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    • 2010.06a
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    • pp.88.2-88.2
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    • 2010
  • Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) have attracted considerable attention on account of their high solar energy-to-conversion efficiencies and low cost processes compared to conventional p-n junction solar cells. The mechanism of DSSC is based on the injection of electrons from the photo excited dyes into the conduction band of the semiconductor electrode. The oxidized dye is reduced by the hole injection into either the hole conductor or the electrolyte. Thus, the light harvesting effect of dye plays an important role in capturing the photons and generating the electron/hole pair, as well as transferring them to the interface of the semiconductor and the electrolyte, respectively. We used the organic fluorescence materials which can absorb short wavelength light and emit longer wavelength region where dye sensitize effectively. In this work, the DSSCs were fabricated with fluorescence materials added $TiO_2$ photo-electrode which were sensitized with metal-free organic dyes. The photovoltaic performances of fluorescence aided DSSCs were compared, and the recombination dark current curves and the incident photon-to-current (IPCE) efficiencies were measured in order to characterize the effects of the additional light harvesting effect in DSSC. Electro-optical measurements were also used to optimize the fluorescence material contents on TiO2 photo-electrode surface for higher conversion efficiency (${\eta}$), fill factor (FF), open-circuit voltage (VOC) and short-circuit current (ISC). The enhanced light harvesting effect by the judicious choice/design of the fluorescence materials and sensitizing dyes permits the enhancement of photovoltaic performance of DSSC.

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