• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.2195-2199
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• 2014

Background: Despite being rare in incidence, malignant tumors of major salivary glands show diverse histological variation. There are limited data on major salivary gland tumor management and outcome from Pakistan. The objective of this study was to share our experience with management of malignant tumors of major salivary glands. Materials and Methods: Patients who received treatment at Shaukat Khanum Cancer Hospital and Research Center from July 2002 to June 2011 with an underlying diagnosis of a major salivary gland malignancy were included. Patient characteristics and treatment modalities were assessed. Local, regional and distant failures were determined. Disease free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) were calculated using Kaplan Meier curves and the Log rank test was used to determine statistical significance. Univariate and multivariate analyses were performed using Cox proportional hazard regression. Results: The parotid gland was the primary site of origin in 104 (80%) patients. Mucoepidermoid carcinoma (43%) and adenoid cystic carcinoma (24%) were the most common histological types. Surgery followed by adjuvant radiation remained the mainstay treatment modality with 81 (62%) patients. Nineteen (15%) patients were treated with surgery alone and 30 (23%) patients with locally advanced surgically inoperable tumors received radiation only. Forty one (32%) patients failed the treatment (local 12, regional 11, locoregional 5, distant 13). The expected 5 year DFS and OS were 65% and 74% respectively. On multivariate analysis, grade was the only independent predictor of DFS and nodal involvement was the only independent predictor of overall survival. Conclusions: Employing existing standards of treatment, comparable survival can be achieved in Pakistani population with major salivary gland malignancies as elsehwere in the world.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.1455-1461
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• 2015

Background: Young onset breast cancer (BC) has a worse outcome as compared to in the elderly. However, some studies have shown that BC in the elderly, despite indolent features, does also cause increase in mortality. In an attempt to compare clinic-pathological characteristics, BC subtypes and survival in patients with BC presenting at extremes of age, we performed a retrospective study. Materials and Methods: Patients were either ${\leq}40$ or ${\geq}70$ years old. Subtypes were defined using immunohistochemistry and histological grade. Chi-Square test was used for evaluation of categorical variables, and Kaplan-meier and log-rank for disease-specific survival (DSS) and disease free survival (DFS). Results: We analyzed 256 patients ${\leq}40$ and 366 patients ${\geq}70$. Younger patients presented with more aggressive disease, with less luminal A but more luminal B and triple negative (TN) subtype. With a median follow-up of 57.5 months, DFS at 5 years in younger patients was 72.3% vs 84.6% in the elderly (p=0.007). Luminal A and B disease presented with worse DFS in younger patients. The opposite was seen in the TN subgroup. Although we found no significant differences in DSS, older patients with TN tumors died of BC more frequently. This group also received less chemotherapy. Conclusions: Young patients present with more aggressive disease, this translating into worse DFS. However, elderly patients with TN disease represent a particular subpopulation with worse DFS and DSS, suggesting that chemotherapy should not be withheld only because of age.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.1539-1543
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• 2015

Background: Uroplakins have been widely investigated as potential markers in patients with bladder cancer because these proteins are specific to the urothelium. However, the role of uroplakin proteins in bladder cancer remains unknown. In this study, preoperative serum levels of uroplakin III were measured in patients with urothelial carcinoma of the urinary bladder and examined for possible association with clinicopathological features and clinical outcomes. Materials and Methods: This study included 52 bladder cancer patients at various stages and 28 healthy controls. Uroplakin III levels were detected in preoperative sera using an automated dot blot system and a micro-dot blot array. Results: There was a significant increase in serum uroplakin III levels in patients with bladder cancer as compared to healthy controls (p<0.05). In addition, serum uroplakin III levels were associated with muscle-invasive status, high grade and lymphovascular invasion (p<0.02). Log-rank tests indicated high serum uroplakin III to be significantly associated with cancer-specific mortality. Conclusions: Determination of serum uroplakin III level could be valuable for identifying patients with biologically aggressive bladder cancer.

• Food Science of Animal Resources
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• v.30 no.6
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• pp.905-909
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• 2010

Two sets of data on carcass traits and beef cut parameters were used to investigate the relationships between carcass and beef cut measurements, which can be used to make predictions of retail cut percentages. One set had a total of 1,141 measurements of Hanwoo cattle of three different sex origins, which were slaughtered in an abattoir located at the National Institute of Animal Science, RDA, Korea from 1996 to 2008. To develop prediction models for retail cut percentage with higher accuracies than the current model, another set consisting of a total of 13,389 records of carcass and beef cut traits were collected from 30 abattoirs and butcheries in Korea from 2008 to 2009. Bulls yielded heavier and leaner carcasses than steers. High correlation coefficients were estimated between amount of body fat and percent retail cut (-0.82) as well as between back fat thickness (BF) and percent retail cut (-0.62). The amount of retail cut, however, was highly correlated with body weight before slaughter (BW, 0.95) or with cold carcass weight (CWT, 0.94). Relationships between percent retail cut and measurable beef yield traits, BF, loin eye area (LEA) or CWT varied by sex class, which must be considered for development of a prediction model with high accuracy. Models of data for all breeds and sexes fit the effects of breed, sex, and interaction of abattoir by butchers, whereas models of data for each breed and sex fit the effect of interaction of abattoir by butcher only. Due to possible future changes in back fat control, we performed a log transformation of BF. Our new models fit better than the currently used model.

• The Journal of the Convergence on Culture Technology
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.357-367
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• 2020

This study is a qualitative study conducted to understand and explain the operating room practice experience of nursing college students. Participants in this study were 67 nursing college students in 3rd and 4th grade at a university in C-gun, Gyeongsangbuk-do who participated in the practice of operating rooms. The data collection period was from January 14, 2019 to January 13, 2020, and the data collection was carried out through an open self-report-style reflection log, and the collected data was analyzed using the traditional content analysis method of Krippendorff [21]. Analysis of the operating room practice experience of nursing college students resulted in 27 sub-themes, 12 themes and 5 categories. The five categories are "Being seized with complicated feelings," "Being faced with dissection body," "Learning the characteristics of the operating room, " "Being confronted with the limits of clinical practice" and "Self-reflection." The results of this study provided an understanding of the operating room practice experience of nursing students and are expected to be used as basic data to improve the quality of practice of nursing students.

• Journal of Gastric Cancer
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.85-92
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• 2016

Purpose: PIK3CA is often mutated in a variety of malignancies, including colon, gastric, ovary, breast, and brain tumors. We investigated PIK3CA expression in gastric cancer and explored the relationships between the PIK3CA expression level and clinicopathological features as well as survival of the patients. Materials and Methods: We examined PIK3CA expression in a tissue microarray of 178 gastric adenocarcinomas by immunohistochemistry and reviewed patients' medical records. Results: In our study, 112 of the 178 gastric cancer patients displayed positive PIK3CA expression. Overexpression of PIK3CA was correlated with low grade differentiation (P=0.001), frequent lymphatic invasion (P=0.032), and high T stage (P=0.040). Patients with positive PIK3CA staining were more likely to display worse overall survival rate than those with negative PIK3CA staining, as determined by Kaplan-Meier survival analysis with log-rank test (P=0.047) and a univariate analysis using the Cox proportional hazard model (hazard ratio=1.832, P=0.051). Conclusions: Elevated PIK3CA expression was significantly correlated with tumor invasiveness, tumor phenotypes, and poor patient survival.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.6
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• pp.2781-2785
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• 2016

Background: Matric metalloproteinase (MMP) 13 gene expression is increased in esophageal squamous cell carcinomas (ESCCs) and associated with increasing tumor invasion, lymph node involvement and decreased survival rates. Levels of the circulating enzyme may be elevated and used as a marker of tumor progression. In this study, clinical application of MMP-13 serum levels was evaluated for early detection, prediction of prognosis and survival time of ESCC patients. Materials and Methods: Serum levels of MMP13 were determined by ELISA in 66 ESCC patients prior of any treatment and 54 healthy controls for comparison with clinicopathological data through statistical analysis with Man Whitney U and Log-Rank tests. In addition, clinical value of MMP13 levels for diagnosis was evaluated by receiver operating characteristic (ROC) test. Results: The serum level of MMP-13 in patients (>250 pg/ml) was significantly higher than in the control group (<100 pg/ml) (p value=0.004). Also the results showed a significant correlation between MMP-13 serum levels with tumor stage (p value = 0.003), depth of tumor invasion (p value=0.008), involvement of lymph nodes (p value = 0.011), tumor size (p value = 0.018) and survival time. While there were no significant correlation with grade and location of tumors. ROC analysis showed that MMP-13 level is an accurate diagnostic marker especially to differentiate pre-invasive/ invasive lesions from normal controls (sensitivity and specificity: 100%). Conclusions: These findings indicate a potential clinical significance of serum MMP13 measurement for early detection and prognostic assessment in ESCC patients.

• Journal of Pathology and Translational Medicine
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• v.52 no.6
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• pp.369-377
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• 2018

Background: Chemokine receptor CXC chemokine receptor type 4 (CXCR4) and its ligand CXC motif chemokine 12 (CXCL12; stromal cell-derived factor-1) are implicated in tumor growth, metastasis, and tumor cell-microenvironment interaction. A number of studies have reported that increased CXCR4 expression is associated with worse prognosis in triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), but its prognostic significance has not been studied in TNBC patients treated with adjuvant chemotherapy. Methods: Two hundred eighty-three TNBC patients who received adjuvant chemotherapy were retrospectively analyzed. Tissue microarray was constructed from formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tumor tissue and immunohistochemistry for CXCR4 and CXCL12 was performed. Expression of each marker was compared with clinicopathologic characteristics and outcome. Results: High cytoplasmic CXCR4 expression was associated with younger age (p=.008), higher histologic grade (p=.007) and lower pathologic stage (p=.045), while high CXCL12 expression was related to larger tumor size (p=.045), positive lymph node metastasis (p=.005), and higher pathologic stage (p=.017). The patients with high cytoplasmic CXCR4 experienced lower distant recurrence (p=.006) and better recurrence-free survival (RFS) (log-rank p=.020) after adjuvant chemotherapy. Cytoplasmic CXCR4 expression remained an independent factor of distant recurrence (p=.019) and RFS (p=.038) after multivariate analysis. Conclusions: High cytoplasmic CXCR4 expression was associated with lower distant recurrence and better RFS in TNBC patients treated with adjuvant chemotherapy. This is the first study to correlate high CXCR4 expression to better TNBC prognosis, and the underlying mechanism needs to be elucidated in further studies.

• Journal of Information Science Theory and Practice
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.6-20
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• 2019

Learning analytics, or educational data mining, is an emerging field that applies data mining methods and tools for the exploitation of data coming from educational environments. Learning management systems, like Moodle, offer large amounts of data concerning students' activity, performance, behavior, and interaction with their peers and their tutors. The analysis of these data can be elaborated to make decisions that will assist stakeholders (students, faculty, and administration) to elevate the learning process in higher education. In this work, the power of Excel is exploited to analyze data in Moodle, utilizing an e-learning course developed for enhancing the information computer technology skills of school teachers in primary and secondary education in Greece. Moodle log files are appropriately manipulated in order to trace daily and weekly activity of the learners concerning distribution of access to resources, forum participation, and quizzes and assignments submission. Learners' activity was visualized for every hour of the day and for every day of the week. The visualization of access to every activity or resource during the course is also obtained. In this fashion teachers can schedule online synchronous lectures or discussions more effectively in order to maximize the learners' participation. Results depict the interest of learners for each structural component, their dedication to the course, their participation in the fora, and how it affects the submission of quizzes and assignments. Instructional designers may take advice and redesign the course according to the popularity of the educational material and learners' dedication. Moreover, the final grade of the learners is predicted according to their previous grades using multiple linear regression and sensitivity analysis. These outcomes can be suitably exploited in order for instructors to improve the design of their courses, faculty to alter their educational methodology, and administration to make decisions that will improve the educational services provided.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information and Communication Engineering
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• v.22 no.11
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• pp.1544-1553
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• 2018

Recently internal information leakage in industries is severely increasing in spite of industry security policy. Thus, it is essential to prepare an information leakage prevention measure by industries. Most of the leaks result from the insiders, not from external attacks. In this paper, a real-time internal information leakage prevention system via both storage and network is implemented in order to protect confidential file leakage. In addition, a Hadoop-based user behavior analysis and statistics system is designed and implemented for storing and analyzing information log data in industries. The proposed system stores a large volume of data in HDFS and improves data processing capability using RHive, consequently helps the administrator recognize and prepare the confidential file leak trials. The implemented audit system would be contributed to reducing the damage caused by leakage of confidential files inside of the industries via both portable data media and networks.