• Health Policy and Management
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.40-52
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• 2015

Background: The purpose of this study was to analyze the increase in Grade of Nursing Management Fee of medical institutions and establish a reasonable government policy by examining which factors affect the increase of nurse staffing. Methods: Analyzing data collected from the Health Insurance Review & Assessment Service resource management department with targets of 1,104 medical institutions. The study period was 5 years from June 30, 2008 to June 30, 2013. SAS ver. 9.2 (SAS Institute Inc., Cary, NC, USA) was used for statistical analysis. The data was analyzed by a chi-square test and also conducted muiltivariate logistic regression analyses for variables of basic characteristics, human resource characteristics, and material resources. Results: Adjusted odds ratio (AOR) of the rise in Grade of Nursing Management Fee among other hospitals compared to hospitals owned by government or universities was 0.264. The AOR in hospitals established after November 2006 compared to those before June 1995 was 2.383. The AOR in Gangwon, Chungcheng South, and Jeolla South Provinces compared to Seoul was 0.084, 0.036, and 0.194, respectively. The AOR in hospitals with more than 6.75 specialists per 100 beds compared to those with less than 6.75 specialists per 100 beds was 7.514. The AOR in hospitals with more than 17.48 nurse per 100 beds compared to those with less than 17.48 nurse per 100 beds was 3.300. The AOR in hospitals with 50% to 75% bed utilization, 75% to 90% bed utilization and more than 90% bed utilization compared to those with less than 50% bed utilization was 5.428, 9.884, and 10.699, respectively. The AOR in hospitals with one magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and more than two MRI compared to those with no MRI was 2.018 and 2.942, respectively. Conclusion: This result has showed policies to induce the rise in Grade of Nursing Management Fee among old hospitals and the incentive system for local medical institutions are needed. Also we need to develop a governmental policy for medium-small hospitals with low operation rate of beds and insufficient medical personnel and number of equipment in hospitals.

• Journal of Periodontal and Implant Science
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.693-703
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• 1999

Since they were introduced by Ward in 1923, periodontal dressing have been routinely used following the periodontal surgery to avoid pain, infection, desensitizing teeth, inhibiting food impaction of the surgical areas, and immobilizing injured areas. Recently, however, the value of periodontal dressings and their effects on periodontal wound healing have been questioned, several authors have been reported that the use of dressing has little influence on healing following periodontal surgical procedures. In addition, there is evidence that when good flap adaptation is achieved, the use of a periodontal dressing does not add to patient comfort nor promote healing. The purpose of this study was to evaluate patient postoperative pain experience and discomfort with and without the use of periodontal dressing following periodontal surgery. Twenty-eight patients, 11 male and 17 female. were selected for this study; The age range was 31 to 56, with an average of 40.2years. Patient selection was based on existence of two bilateral sites presenting similar periodontal involvement, as determined by clinical and radiographic assessment, and requiring comparable bilateral surgical procedures. Using a splitmouth dressing. one site received a periodontal dressing while the other site did not. Pain assessment was made according to a horizontal, rating scale(0-10). After at least a two-week period, the second surgical precedure was performed using the alternate postoperative treatment. At the conclusion of the trial, a self-administered questionnaire on postoperative experience was administered, and were asked of their preference of either, dressed or undressed. The results were as follows: 1. A similar trend for mean pain and discomfort scores as assessed by patients both dressed and salinetreated procedures was evident during 7-day postsurgical period. 2. Statistical analysis of differences between the dressed side and salinetreated side with respect to pain, discomfort and patient's experiences revealed that both treatment sides behaved similarly at any postoperative day(P>0.05). 3. Considering the patient's preference, on the basis of pain and discomfort experienced, 43% preferred the saline-mouthwash and 32% preferred the dressing, 25% showing no preference for either the dressing or the saline-mouthwash. There is evidence to support the use of a periodontal dressing in retention of an apically positioned flap by preventing coronal displacement, or its use to provide additional support to stabilize a free gingival graft. However, there will always be a use for periodontal dressing although routine use of dressings may decrease because of better surgical techniques and the use of antibacterial mouth rinses.

• Science of Emotion and Sensibility
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.35-50
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• 2020

This study aimed to investigate the changes of emotional perception biases according to the level of social phobia and the relationship with visuospatial attention allocation ability. This study used the Korean self-report assessment test (Korean version of social avoidance and distress, K-SAD) to measure the level of social phobia. Moreover, the emotional perception and useful field of view (UFOV) tasks were employed for measuring emotional perception biases and visuospatial attention allocation ability, respectively. A total of 118 participants participated in this experiment, and only 107 (males: 94, females: 13) data were analyzed due to the exclusion of response errors and other statistical problems. The average age of the participants used in the analysis was 21 years (SD: 3.64), and those participants were divided into three groups according to the K-SAD scores. Consequently, all experimental groups showed negative emotional perception biases in the emotional perception task, but the magnitudes of the biases of each group were not significantly different. Furthermore, the positive emotional perception biases were higher at higher levels of social phobia, which could be related to the tendency of interpreting positive stimuli negatively. In the UFOV task, the higher the level of social phobia, the lower the visuospatial attention allocation ability. These results suggest that the deterioration of visuospatial attention allocation ability potentially contributes to the increase of positive emotional perception biases by being difficult to perceive external stimuli. Thus, this paper discusses the potential contribution of visuospatial attention allocation ability to the increased perceptual biases of positive emotions as the level of social phobia increases.

• Journal of Korean Society of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.334-345
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• 2006

The objectives of this study were to analyze and compare 24 hrs personal exposure levels of MF at microenvironments such as home, school, educational institute, internet pc game room, transportation, and other places according to time activity patterns using various metrics for children attending the primary schools located near and away from the power lines, and to characterize the major microenvironments and impact factors attributed personal exposure level. The study was carried out for 44 children attending a primary school away from the lines(school A) and 125 children attending a school away from 154 kV power lines(school B), all who aged 12 years and were 6 grade, from July 2003 to December 2003. All participants filled in a questionnaire about characteristics, residence, use of electrical appliances and others. Children wore a small satchel in which EMDEX II and Lite (Enertech, Co. Ltd) and a diary of activity list for period of registration in 20 minutes blocks. All statistical calculations were made with the SAS System, Releas 6.12. The summary of results was presented below. First, about the characteristics of subjects, there no differences between two groups. The subject almost spent about 56 % of their time at home and about 20~25 % of their time at school. Fifty percent of children spent 2 hours at private educational institutes. Second, the personal exposure measurements of children in school B was statistically higher than those of children in school A by various metrics such as arithmetic mean, geometric mean, percentile(5, 25, 50, 75, 95), maximum, rate of change metric, constant field metric. The arithmetic and geometric mean magnetic fields during the time the children were at school B were 0.98 and $0.86{\mu}T$ and were about 23 times higher than those of children were at school A. In conclusion, the significant major determinants of personal exposure level is the distance from the power line to microenvironments.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.999-1024
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• 2012

The Purpose of this study was to assess the willingness to pay(WTP) for the new road construction plan(slip road of urban highway which was advertising extensively to reduce the time to the core of metropolitan area) on housing prices using contingent valuation method(CVM). And this study was an empirical study which was based on the consciousness of residents whose apartment was within the Suwon Si's new plan of 47th road construction zone. In this study, it was revealed that the resident's WTP for the plan of new road construction which was built on the neighborhood of apartment was within the 10 percent of housing prices that was similar to the standard declared price of MLTM(Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime Affairs). And also revealed that the difference of sale prices of real estate company was 24 percent. The statistical assessment results show that both the resident's characteristic variables such as gender, incomes, size of apartment and the accessability variables such as distance to parks, schools, department stores, living facilities were positive effects on the prices of apartments significantly. Finally, the house has depreciated than that of MLTM and WTO since torpedoed the road construction plan. These results imply that, we have to take capital appreciation of the property into account due to road construction since the accessibility was very significantly positive internal effects on the apartment housing prices.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.62-72
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• 2017

Spatio-temporal projection of evapotranspiration over croplands would be useful for assessment of climate change impact and development of adaptation strategies in agriculture. Potential evapotranspiration (PET) and dryness index (DI) during rice growing seasons were calculated using climate change scenario data provided by the National Institute of Meteorological Research (NIMR). A data processing tool for gridded climate data files, readGrADSWrapper, was used to calculate PET and DI during the current (1986-2005) and future (2006-2100) periods. Scripts were written to implement the formulas of PET and DI in R, which is an open source statistical data analysis tool. Evapotranspiration in rice fields ($PET_{Rice}$) was also determined using R scripts. The Spatio-temporal patterns of PET differed by regions in Korean Peninsula under current and future climate conditions. Overall, PET and $PET_{Rice}$ tended to increase throughout the $21^{st}$ century. Those results suggested that region-specific water resource managements would be needed to minimize the risk of water loss in the regions where considerable increases in PET would occur under the future climate conditions. For example, a number of provinces classified as a humid region were projected to become a sub-humid region in the future. The Spatio-temporal assessment of water resources based on PET and DI would help the development of climate change adaptation strategies for rice production in the 21st century. In addition, the studies on climate change impact would be facilitated using specialized data tools, e.g., readGrADSWrapper, for geospatial analysis of climate data.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Marine Environment & Safety
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.278-285
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• 2016

The key features of maritime accidents are the change of their attributes by new risks from time to time. To prevent maritime accidents in Korea, the impacts by new risks on domestic safety environments should be identified or predicted. The purpose of this paper is to find the hazard factors by new risks on maritime safety in Korea. The meaning of new risks is the elements of accident hazard which is compiled from new or rare or unprecedented events in the worldwide maritime transportations. The problems of new risks are the lacks of optimum countermeasures to mitigate accident risks. Using the questionnaires with 152 event scenarios classified by 20 accident causes, the hazard identification and risk analysis of new risks was performed based on the Formal Safety Assessment (FSA) by IMO. A total of 22 Influence Diagrams, which is to depict the transit flows between accident causes to consequences, is used in the construction of 152 event scenarios. A total of 20 accidents causes is the same contents as the causation factors represented in Statistical Year Book for Maritime Accidents of Korean Maritime Safety Tribunals. After defining the evaluation equations to the response results of questionnaires by 46 experts, the work for risk analysis is carried out. As results from the analysis of 152 scenarios, it is known that the root cause to affect on maritime safety in Korea is the pressure of business competition and it led to the lacks of well experienced crews, the overload of vessel operations and crew's fatigue. In addition, as results from the analysis of 20 accident causes, the three accident causes are to be candidate as main issues in Korea such as the inadequate preparedness of departure, the neglecting of watch keeping in bridge and the inadequate management of ship operations. All of the results are thought to be as basic hazard factors to safety impediments. It is thus found that the optimum Risk Control Options to remove the hazard factors and to mitigate consequences required are the following two factors: business competition and crewing problems.

• Journal of the Korea Organic Resources Recycling Association
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.73-82
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• 2020

This study was conducted to investigate the differences in carbon storage capacity of soil between the conventional and the organic agricultural cultivation followed by the assessment of their economic values. An analysis of 107 samples in the organic and the conventional rice cultivation soils in six regions across South Korea showed that the five regions, Buyeo-II, Gimhae, Sancheong-I, II and Suncheon, had higher organic soil carbon contents than those of values observed on the conventional soils with the exception of the Buyeo-I areas. Based on the results from soil carbon contents, the carbon storage were estimated to be 36.1 megagram carbon (MgC) per ha in the organic paddy soils, while its conventional paddy soils were 29.4 MgC per ha. It showed that the organic paddy soils were 23 % greater than that of its conventional paddy soils. It was estimated that the carbon trading price for economic assessment was ￦758,100 per ha in the organic paddy soil and ￦617,400 per ha in the conventional paddy soil.

• The Korean Journal of Applied Statistics
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.391-401
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• 2017

This study develops an indicator to manage regional variations of approval rates for long-term care (LTC) service. We used LTC insurance data for grade assessment that include 433,155 applicants from 227 LTC centers across Korea in 2015. The approval rate for each center was defined as the proportion of the numbers of approved applicants out of all applicants. We assumed that the approval rates depended on the characteristics of applicants. We estimated the 'standard' approval rates from a multiple linear regression analysis using the characteristics of applicants as independent variables. The difference between the observed and the standard rates was then defined as an indicator for deviation. A center having a large difference could be considered as a center with a potential error in grade assessment. We also examined if the characteristics of investigators affected the approval rates. We found that the socio-demographic characteristics of applicants and reapplication rate for LTC grade were independent factors affecting the approval rates. Centers having the management indicator values falling outside the middle 95% of the distribution were identified as centers with an error in grading. We expect that this study will contribute to enhancing reliability and equity in LTC grading.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.8
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• pp.4077-4082
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• 2016

Background: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a dreadful complication of end stage liver disease with high morbidity and mortality. Aim: The aim was to assess the role of serum talin-1 and non-invasive fibrosis in patients with HCC. Materials and Methods: A total of eighty seven subjects were enrolled, with 22 two healthy individuals as a control group (n=22), 22 patients in the cirrhosis group and finally 43 in the group with HCC diagnosed with positive triphasic CT abdomen criteria. Serum talin-1 and noninvasive fibrosis parameters were assessed in all subjects. Results: Compared to the cirrhosis group, patients with HCC had higher serum talin-1 ($32.9{\pm}12.6$ vs. $11.1{\pm}2.79ng/ml$), FIB4 ($9.96{\pm}15.3$ vs. $2.90{\pm}1.87$) and $fibro-{\alpha}$ ($10.9{\pm}18.1$ vs. $1.55{\pm}0.28$) but not fibrosis index scores ($4.47{\pm}0.95$ vs. $4.98{\pm}0.96$; p=0.046). Patients with large focal lesions (${\geq}5cm$) had different ALBI scores ($-1.02{\pm}0.63$ vs. $-1.72{\pm}0.59$; p=0.001) serum talin-1 ($9.72{\pm}13.81$ vs. $28.6{\pm}38.89ng/ml$; p=0.007) and fibrosis index scores ($0.85{\pm}0.99$ vs. $4.20{\pm}4.85$; p=0.026). No statistical differences were noted between patients with and without portal vein thrombosis. For detection of HCC, serum talin-1 had 97.7% sensitivity and 100% specificity with a 17.2 ng/ml cutoff. AFP at a 13.7 ng/ml cutoff had 72.1% sensitivity and 6.3.6% specificity. The cutoff for the $fibro-{\alpha}$ score was 1.61 with 81.4% sensitivity and 77.3% specificity. Serum talin-1 (odds=1.08; C.I=1.016-1.150; p=0.014), fibrosis index score (odds=2.35; C.I=1.055-5.217; p=0.037) and the ALBI score (odds=6.9; C.I=1.924-24.708; p=0.003) were predictors of large focal lesions. Conclusions: Serum talin-1, AST/ALT ratio, $fibro-{\alpha}$ score are useful for the assessment of HCC patients.