• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 2015.07a
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• pp.1243-1244
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• 2015

Finding solutions for the disabled is a major challenge for our society. In the case of a disability due to a malfunction of the nervous system, the origin may be accidental, genetic, or induced by environmental factors. This type of loss can cause loss or movement disorders (paraplegia, hemiplegia, quadriplegia, epilepsy, Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, etc.) or malfunction of certain sensory functions (blindness, deafness, chronic pain, etc.). Many alternatives, more technology, have been imported to create interfaces between the human body and an artificial prosthesis in order to restore some functions of the human body. A wireless system, battery neurons probe was developed for one hand reading neural signals in the brain, and on the other hand also able to excite the neuron in the brain using a surface acoustic wave one ports (SAW) delay line reflection.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.163-171
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• 2018

A mixed dysarthria with combinations of hypokinetic, ataxic, and spastic components is a common clinical feature of multiple system atrophy (MSA). Due to the rapid progress of dysarthria after diagnosis, people with MSA experience difficulty with verbal communication, which eventually affects their quality of life negatively. In this study, SPEAK $OUT!^{(R)}$, an intensive 1:1 treatment of dysarthria for improving functional communicative ability, was provided to twelve people with MSA. To evaluate the efficacy of SPEAK $OUT!^{(R)}$ in people with MSA, aerodynamic, acoustic, and perceptual analyses were conducted. Pre-and post-therapy data included maximum phonation time, vocal intensity, and fundamental frequency during /a/ sustained phonation and passage reading; frequency range between high /a/ and low /a/ phonation; jitter, shimmer, and HNR for vocal quality; speech rate during passage reading; and perceptual evaluation scores for articulation precision and intonation. The participants achieved statistically significant improvement in vocal intensity, pitch range, vocal quality, speech rate, and speech intelligibility. In conclusion, SPEAK $OUT!^{(R)}$ is a feasible treatment for people with MSA to efficaciously improve their speech ability.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.77-87
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• 2019

The study aimed to develop Speech Range Profile (SRP) and to examine and validate its clinical application. Forty-five participants without voice disorders aged 18-29 years were compared using SRP and Voice Range Profile (VRP). The authors developed the "Fire!" paragraph as a SRP task compromising 14 sentences including all Korean spoken phonemes and sentence types. To compare SRP and VRP results, the participants read the paragraph (reading) and counted from 21 to 30 (counting) as a part of SRP tasks, and produced a vowel /a/ from low to high frequencies (gliding) and a shortened form of the VRP as a part of VRP tasks. $F0_{max}$, $F0_{min}$, $F0_{range}$, $I_{max}$, $I_{min}$, and $I_{range}$ for each task were measured and compared, showing that $F0_{max}$, $F0_{min}$, $F0_{range}$, $I_{max}$, and $I_{range}$ were not different between reading and gliding. $I_{min}$, had the lowest value in counting. It is concluded that the newly developed SRP task, reading the "Fire" paragraph, can yield a maximum phonation range similar to that found by VRP. Therefore, it is expected that voice evaluation can be effectively performed in a relatively short time by applying SRP with the "Fire" paragraph, a functional utterance task, in place of VRP, which may be difficult to measure long term or in cases of severe voice disorders.

• Journal of Photoscience
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.497-499
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• 2002

We experienced 29 cases of tentative photo allergic disorders from April 2000 to March 2002. For those 29 patients, photopatch tests have been done to explore possible causative photoallergens. We performed photopatch tests with photo-related allergens and possible causative products that the patients brought to us. After applications for 48hrs, one test site was irradiated with half of MRD or 6.0 J/cm$^2$ of UVA. Readings were evaluated according to the reading criteria of the ICDRG. Photoallergens were suggested in 20 cases (69.0%). Among them, we could find out the causative products in 7 cases (24.1%). Photopatch tests, performed by an appropriate method, are useful in some cases not only for diagnosis of photocontact dermatitis but also diagnosis of systemic photoallergic disorders.

• Psychiatry investigation
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• v.15 no.12
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• pp.1144-1153
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• 2018

Objective One of the areas of social cognition is Theory of Mind (ToM) is defined as the capacity to interpret, infer and explain mental states underlying the behavior of others. When social cognition studies on neurodevelopmental disorders are examined, it can be seen that this skill has not been studied sufficiently in children with Specific Learning Disorder (SLD). Methods In this study, social cognition skills in children diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), SLD or Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) evaluated before puberty and compared with controls. To evaluate the ToM skills, the first and second-order false belief tasks, the Hinting Task, the Faux Pas Test and the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Task were used. Results We found that children with neurodevelopmental disorders as ADHD, ASD, and SLD had ToM deficits independent of intelligence and language development. There was a significant correlation between social cognition deficits and problems experienced in many areas such as social communication and interaction, attention, behavior, and learning. Conclusion Social cognition is an important area of impairment in SLD and there is a strong relationship between clinical symptoms and impaired functionality.

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.399-405
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• 2012

The brain is the body's most organized and controlled organ, and it governs various psychological and mental functions. A brain abnormality could greatly affect one's physical and mental abilities, and consequently one's social life. Brain disorders can be broadly categorized into three main afflictions: stroke, brain tumor, and dementia. Among these, stroke is a common disease that occurs owing to a disorder in blood flow, and it is accompanied by a sudden loss of consciousness and motor paralysis. The main types of strokes are infarction and hemorrhage. The exact diagnosis and early treatment of an infarction are very important for the patient's prognosis and for the determination of the treatment direction. In this study, texture features were analyzed in order to develop a prototype auto-diagnostic system for infarction using computer auto-diagnostic software. The analysis results indicate that of the six parameters measured, the average brightness, average contrast, flatness, and uniformity show a high cognition rate whereas the degree of skewness and entropy show a low cognition rate. On the basis of these results, it was suggested that a digital CT image obtained using the computer auto-diagnostic software can be used to provide valuable information for general CT image auto-detection and diagnosis for pre-reading. This system is highly advantageous because it can achieve early diagnosis of the disease and it can be used as supplementary data in image reading. Further, it is expected to enable accurate medical image detection and reduced diagnostic time in final-reading.

• The Korean Journal of Nuclear Medicine
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• v.35 no.4
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• pp.224-230
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• 2001

EBM is "the conscientious, explicit and judicious use of current best evidence in mating decisions about the care of the individual patient. It means integrating individual clinical expertise with the best available external clinical evidence from systematic research." EBM is the integration of clinical expertise, patient values, and the best evidence into the decision making process for patient care. The practice of EBM is usually triggered by patient encounters which generate questions about the effects of therapy, the utility of diagnostic tests, the prognosis of diseases, or the etiology of disorders. The best evidence is usually found in clinically relevant research that has been conducted using sound methodology. Evidence-based medicine requires new skills of the clinician, including efficient literature-searching, and the application of formal rules of evidence in evaluating the clinical literature. Evidence-based medicine converts the abstract exercise of reading and appraising the literature into the pragmatic process of using the literature to benefit individual patients while simultaneously expanding the clinician's knowledge base. This review will briefly discuss about concepts of evidence medicine and method of critical appraisal of literatures.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Laryngology, Phoniatrics and Logopedics
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.183-187
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• 2022

Dysphonia is well known as one of the otolaryngological symptoms of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) infection. The vocal changes of the COVID-19 condition have been reported in terms of parameters of multi-dimensional voice assessment, including acoustic analysis, auditory-perceptual evaluation, and psychometric assessment. However, there has not been a daily followup study in patients with acute COVID-19 infection. In this study, a 41-year-old male performed daily voice recordings of vowel phonation and passage-reading tasks during the self-quarantine period of one week. Compared to the normal voice status of the prepandemic period, voice abnormalities peaked on day two after the diagnosis of COVID-19 infection and recovered after one week.

• Phonetics and Speech Sciences
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.9-18
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• 2019

The purpose of this study is to determine whether the mean fundamental frequency (F0) changes depending on language, task, or language proficiency for Korean-English bilinguals. A total of forty-eight Korean-English speakers (28 balanced bilinguals and 20 Korean dominant bilinguals) participated in the study. Participants were asked to read aloud two types of tasks in English and Korean. For statistical analyses, the language ${\times}$ task two-way repeated ANOVAs were conducted within the balanced bilingual group first, and then group ${\times}$ language two-way mixed ANOVAs. The results showed that the females in both bilingual groups changed their mean F0 depending on the language they used and the tasks (p<.05), whereas no significant results were found in the males in either group under any conditions. The mean fundamental frequency in the Korean reading task was significantly higher than that in the English reading task for females in both balanced and Korean dominant bilingual groups. Thus, changes in mean F0 depending on language and context may reflect gender-specific characteristics, and females seem to be more sensitive to the socio-cultural standards that are imposed on them.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.19 no.12
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• pp.270-278
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• 2019

This study was performed to compare the aerodynamic characteristics of young and elderly adult male patients with voice disorders during continuous speech. Aerodynamic measurements were obtained after 12 young male patients and 9 elderly male patients read a paragraph. The elderly group showed longer duration, lower airflow rate and air volume than the younger group, but the differences were not significant except phonation time. So, when interpreting the meaning of aerodynamic measures of elderly voice disorder patients in the aspects of airflow and air volume, it should take into account various conditions(e. g. reading materials, pulmonary functions) as well as age.