• Journal of Nutrition and Health
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• v.38 no.9
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• pp.786-792
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• 2005

With dramatic transitions from a traditionally food-insecure to a food-sufficient society, over weight and/or obesity are an increasing health concern in Korea. In 2000, $35.9\%$ of Korean adults were over weight (BMI>25) with increasing trends. It is well known that obesity is highly correlated with chronic diseases, such as diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, cancer and high cholesterol. In 2003, the social cost of obesity is estimated at $529.5\~799.3$ billion won (direct cost) and at $1,200\~1,817$ billion won (including indirect cost). The share of the direct cost is estimated at $2.6\~3.9\%$ of total medical bill 20,742 billion won. These costs are underestimated and would surely be higher if the expenditures outside of the official medical insurance system of Korea were included. Based on the rapid increase of obesity rate among the Korean youth, it is crucial to develop and implement appropriate policies to curb the obesity epidemic.

• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.33 no.5
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• pp.434-440
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• 2007

The livestocks are sometimes infected with pathogenic microorganisms such as bird influenza, brucellosis, pig cholerae, and salmonella. However, it is difficult to predict the outcome of these diseases because the livestocks are mostly raised in the rural areas. Efficient systems for detecting and alerting the onset of livestock diseases are urgently required. In these studies, the fluorescent analysis method, luminescent analysis method, and frequently used gene amplification method (polymerase chain reaction) have been developed in order to detect the pathogenic microbes in the early stages of disease progression. By using these developed systems, damages due to the livestock diseases induced by microbes can be minimized. If we can detect livestock diseases in the early stage, the costs for diagnosis and treatment will be reduced, and the livestock can be quickly recovered.

• The Korean Journal of Health Service Management
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.1-15
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• 2009

The purpose of this study is to analyze the internal factors that influence the performance of local government hospitals in Korea. There are 34 hospitals in korea as of 2008. Among these hospitals 5 are profit-making and the other loss-making in terms of profitability. Data was collected by Institute of local government hospital union. The major findings of this study was as follows : Firstly, 7 hospitals are high level, over than 100% of fixed ratio. But that result was better than the other study 5 years ago. Secondly, 29 hospitals are bellow 85% of bed occupancy rate. There are a number of hospitals didn't use the facilities and the personnel cost in total costs are high. And lastly, as a result of multiple regression analysis, the factors had on significant effect on normal profit to total assets are personnel cost(-), liability to total assets(-), average length of stay(-), outpatient visits to inpatient days(-). In conclusion, to improve the profitability of hospitals, the efforts to reduce personnel cost and to increase bed occupancy rate.

• YAKHAK HOEJI
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• v.51 no.3
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• pp.186-193
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• 2007

This study was performed to analyse the economic value of abciximab which is used in PCI to prevent high-risk patients with ischemic complications. The effectiveness of abciximab was extracted from published clinical trials by search-ing CCIS, and the direct medical costs relevant to using abciximab were estimated from the NHI claims database. The results in terms of cost per life-year gained (LYG) and cost per QALY gained showed that abciximab was cost-effective enough to deserve its cost. Social net benefit resulting from abciximab in PCI was estimated to be 60-70 billion Won per year.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.435-446
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• 2002

Purpose : The purpose of the study were to describe outcomes of CHP activities, and to evaluate the economic validity of CHP through a cost-benefit analysis. Method : The sample size was 272. Data were collected using a researcher developed questionnaire from November 1999 to March, 2000. Result : The mean age of CHPs was 39.6 (SD-36). In regard to marital status, 90.8% of the respondents were married. 72% of the CHPs had associate degree. Among CHP activities, providing medical services was 50%, followed by home care visits 20% and health promotion services 20%, preventive services 10%. Total costs per month incurred to CHP activities was \3,053,437($2,442.7). Total benefits per month was \6,711,525($5,369.2). Hence, net benefit was calculated as \3,658,089($2,926). Conclusion : Cost-benefit ratio was 2.20, which provides the evidence of the economic viability of CHP program. The result of cost-benefit analysis, however, would more strongly support the economic value of CHP if intangible benefits of CHP activities such as decreases in pain and suffering and increased quality of life, could be counted.

• Journal of Communications and Networks
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.350-358
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• 2009

In a wireless sensor network (WSN) setting, this paper presents a distributed decision-making framework and illustrates its application in an online structural health monitoring (SHM) system. The objective is to recover a damage severity vector, which identifies, localizes, and quantifies damages in a structure, via distributive and collaborative decision-making among wireless sensors. Observing the fact that damages are generally scarce in a structure, this paper develops a nonlinear 0-norm minimization formulation to recover the sparse damage severity vector, then relaxes it to a linear and distributively tractable one. An optimal algorithm based on the alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM) and a heuristic distributed linear programming (DLP) algorithm are proposed to estimate the damage severity vector distributively. By limiting sensors to exchange information among neighboring sensors, the distributed decision-making algorithms reduce communication costs, thus alleviate the channel interference and prolong the network lifetime. Simulation results in monitoring a steel frame structure prove the effectiveness of the proposed algorithms.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.513-521
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• 2020

Aging populations and the increasing mental health issues among them have set a new challenge for the international community, governments, and people. Given this, society's role is very important, and involving the local community in resolving the problems can play a pivotal role. The current study presented the systematic review of the financing mechanism and cost-effectiveness of the "social prescribing" (SP) project in the United Kingdom and how SP can be adapted for other settings. The data showed comparatively low running costs and the overall effectiveness of SP projects. The running cost of SP projects varied between £54,525 and £1.1 million. The cost-effectiveness of the projects reported as 12% and the return of investment was about 50% depending on the type of analysis and the activities implemented. This type of intervention can be one of the options that support solving the issues of aging populations and their accompanying mental disorders.

• Development and Reproduction
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.321-326
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• 2021

The purpose of this paper is to critique the links between science and scientific researchers, politics and capital surrounding vaccines and vaccination in a pandemic era. It also introduces standards for adapting ethical guidelines for research under public health emergencies to specific circumstances and contexts. It also introduces ethical standards to be applied to scientific research. that is, scientific relevance, social value, cooperative partnerships, reasonable risk-benefit costs, fair and voluntary participation, independent review, and equal moral respect for participants and affected communities. It also outlines the COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic-consent and other research procedure modifications proposed by Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU). We are on the lookout for powerful capital and hegemonic groups inseparable from politics and important decision makers in the pandemic era - that is, scientists, supporters, and scientific civic groups. It underscores the need for an independent and formal scientific advisory body with the right balance between science and politics.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.91 no.2
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• pp.163-175
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• 2024

The objective of this research is to improve public safety in civil engineering by recognizing fractures in concrete structures quickly and correctly. The study offers a new crack detection method based on advanced image processing and machine learning techniques, specifically transfer learning with convolutional neural networks (CNNs). Four pre-trained models (VGG16, AlexNet, ResNet18, and DenseNet161) were fine-tuned to detect fractures in concrete surfaces. These models constantly produced accuracy rates greater than 80%, showing their ability to automate fracture identification and potentially reduce structural failure costs. Furthermore, the study expands its scope beyond crack detection to identify concrete health, using a dataset with a wide range of surface defects and anomalies including cracks. Notably, using VGG16, which was chosen as the most effective network architecture from the first phase, the study achieves excellent accuracy in classifying concrete health, demonstrating the model's satisfactorily performance even in more complex scenarios.

• Quality Improvement in Health Care
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.93-112
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• 2006

This study reviewed published studies on interventions used by hospitals, health insurance programs, or governments to improve use of medicines in foreign countries. Interventions to improve use of medicines are classified into two categories: 1) information strategies-dissemination of educational materials, group education, one-to-one educational outreach, drug utilization review, and feedback; 2) managerial strategies- formularies, prior authorization, and financial incentives. Dissemination of educational materials, which is a common intervention, was unsuccessful in changing physicians' prescribing behaviors. Problem-based small group education was more likely to change behaviors than didactic large group education. One-to-one educational outreach(academic detailing) was among the most effective strategies used to change prescribing behaviors. Prospective drug utilization review (DUR) program was more successful in improving use of medicines than retrospective DUR program. Feedback intervention has been reported to be ineffective to change behaviors. Formularies are frequently used to control medication use by most health insurance programs. Financial incentives provide physicians economic incentives according to appropriateness of prescribing. However, few published studies have assessed the efficacy of formularies or financial incentives. Prior authorization requires physicians to get authorization from health insurers before prescribing a certain group of drugs which is usually of high costs or risk. There is no magic bullet for quality use of medicines. Multifaceted interventions that help to predispose, enable, and reinforce desired behaviors are more likely to be successful.