• Journal of Gastric Cancer
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.159-171
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• 2024

Purpose: Gastric cancer is one of the most common cancers in Korea, and the proportion of upper-third gastric cancers has been steadily increasing over the last two decades. This study aimed to evaluate the effect of tumor location on gastric cancer prognosis. Materials and Methods: We retrospectively reviewed 2,466 patients who underwent gastrectomy for pathologically proven gastric cancer between January 2011 and December 2016. The patients were divided into an upper-third group (U group; n=419, 17.0%) and a middle- and lower-third group (ML group; n=2,047, 83.0%). Clinicopathological characteristics, overall survival (OS), and recurrence-free survival (RFS) after surgery were compared. Results: The U group had more advanced disease than the ML group and a higher incidence of N3b disease for T3 (12.0% vs. 4.9%, p=0.023) and T4 tumors (33.3% vs. 17.5%, p=0.001). The 5-year RFS rate for stage III disease was marginally lower in the U group than that in the ML group (47.1% vs. 56.7%, p=0.082). The upper third location was an independent prognostic factor for both OS (hazard ratio [HR], 1.350; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.065-1.711) and RFS (HR, 1.430; 95% CI, 1.080-1.823). Conclusions: Upper-third gastric cancer shows extensive node metastasis compared to those located more distally in ≥T3 tumors. The upper third location is an independent prognostic factor for both OS and RFS and may have an adverse impact on RFS, particularly in patients with stage III gastric cancer.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.483-496
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• 1996

The purpose of this study was to describe how Korean nurses overcome the language barrier while working in the U.S. hospital settings. Twelve Korean nurses living in New York metropolitan area were asked open-ended, descriptive questions to collect the data. The interviews were done in Korean. All interviews were audiotaped under the permission of the participants and were transcribed verbatim. The data were analyzed using grounded theory analysis. The research process consisted of two phases. In the first phase 8 Korean nurses were interviewed and analyzed. In the second phase, further data were collected to verify categories and working hypotheses that were emerged from the first phase. The results of this study show that all Korean nurses experienced severe psychological stress such as confusion, anxiety, frustration, loss of self-confidence, embarrassment, guilt, depression, anger, and fear. Among the mode of communication such as listening, speaking, leading, and writing, they had the most difficulty in speaking. Speaking ability was especially important for them because of the emphasis of individualism and self-defense in the U.S. Among the verbal communication modes, non-face-to-face communications such as phone conversation and body language were the most difficu1t for them to overcome. It took at least 2 years for the participants to initially overcome the language barrier in U.S. hospitals. After 2-5 years they began to feel comfortable even in non-face-to-face communication. They could actively search for the better place to work after 5 years. They finally felt comfortable in English and in their job almost after 10 years. The factors that influenced the English improvement were ‘the years of clinical experience in Korea’, ‘the decade they came to the U.S.’ ‘coming to U.S. alone or with other Korean nurses’, ‘racial homogeneity or heterogeneity of the working unit’, and ‘the degree of social support’. The strategies Korean nurses used to overcome the language barrier included depending on the written communication, using ‘nunchi’, working and studying hard, and establishing good interpersonal relationships with co-workers. They also employed assertive behavior of the U.S., such as using more explicit verbal language and employing smiles and eye contact with others during the conversation. The results of the study may help Korean nurses and nursing students who try to work in U.S. hospital settings by understanding problems other Korean nurses faced, factors that influenced their English improvement, and strategies they used. They may also help U.S. nurses and administrators in developing and implementing efficient programs for newly employed Korean nurses by understanding major problems and feelings the Korean nurses experienced and strategies they used to overcome the language barriers.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.13-17
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• 2012

An integrated medical information system should be equipped for the activation of u-healthcare service. In addition, the integrated medical information system should be based on an authentication system to be implemented in a safe environment. However, several requirements are being developed yet. In this paper, biometric authentication system will be designed and proposed for u-healthcare services for the integrated medical information system to go one step further.

• Journal of Acupuncture Research
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.93-100
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• 2016

Objectives : To find an acupuncture point where more exact Surface Electromyography(SEMG) measurement can be drown, through the study of measurement of orbicularis oris. Methods : Of healthy people from 19 to 40 years of age, who did not fall under exclusion criteria (22 males and 22 females), were selected as subjects, after relaxation for 10 minutes, and they were told how to pronounce 'O' and 'U' with their lips puckered. The SEMG figures were measured with attaching disposable electrode on acupuncture point of right-and-left Hwaryo(LI19) and 1 cun away from Seungjang(CV24) on both sides when the subjects pronounced 'O' and 'U'. Results : The average value was highest on left 1 cun away from Seungjang(CV24) in pronouncing 'O' and 'U', and the average SEMG value was higher in the order of right 1 cun away from Seungjang(CV24), right Hwaryo(LI19), left Hwaryo(LI19). Average of the lower orbicularis oris is statistically higher than that of the upper orbicularis oris, which has significant meaning. However, there was no significant difference when compared by pronunciation. Average of percentage mark of differences of right-and-left measured value of each pronunciation and each acupuncture point : Pronounced 'O' and the upper part of orbicularis oris: $16.76{\pm}11.29%$, pronounced 'O' and the lower part of orbicularis oris: $22.41{\pm}12.92%$, pronounced 'U' and the upper part of orbicularis oris: $17.10{\pm}9.89%$, pronounced 'U' and the lower part of orbicularis oris : $19.20{\pm}10.82%$. Conclusion : The difference of pronunciation will not affect the results in SEMG measurement. In addition, the average of the lower orbicularis oris is statistically and significantly higher than that of the upper orbicularis oris.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.11 no.11
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• pp.415-420
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• 2013

U-WHS refers to a means of remote health monitoring service to combine fitness with wellbing. U-WHS is a system which can measure and manage biometric information of patients without any limitation on time and space. In this paper, we performed in order to look into the influence that the encryption module influences on the communication evaluation in the biometric information transmission gone to the smart mobile device and Hospital Information System.In the case of the U-WHS model, the client used the Objective-c programming language for software development of iOS Xcode environment and SEED and HIGHT encryption module was applied. In the case of HIS, the MySQL which is the Websocket API of the HTML5 and relational database management system for the client and inter-server communication was applied. Therefore, in WIFI communication environment, by using wireshark, data transfer rate of the biometric information, delay and loss rate was checked for the evaluation.

• Laboratory Medicine Online
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.25-30
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• 2016

Background: The cell cycle-dependent enzyme thymidine kinase 1 (TK1) is known to increase during cancer cell proliferation and has been reported as a prognostic marker for various hematologic malignancies and solid tumors. This study aimed to determine the reference interval in Korean healthy controls and to evaluate the usefulness of TK1 as a biomarker for aggressive clinical behavior in B-cell lymphoma patients. Methods: We enrolled 72 previously untreated patients with B-cell lymphoma and 143 healthy controls. Serum TK1 levels were measured by chemiluminescence immunoassay ($Liaison^{(R)}$, DiaSorin, USA). We established the reference intervals in healthy controls. The diagnostic performance of serum TK1 was studied using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis, and the correlation between the cutoff level for serum TK1 and clinical characteristics of B-cell lymphoma was evaluated. Results: The reference range (95th percentile) of serum TK1 in healthy controls was 5.4-21.8 U/L. There was a clear difference in TK1 levels between patients with B-cell lymphoma and healthy controls ($40.6{\pm}68.5$ vs. $11.8{\pm}4.4U/L$, P <0.001). The area under the curve of serum TK1 for the diagnosis of B-cell lymphoma was 0.73 (cutoff, 15.2 U/L; sensitivity, 59.7%; specificity, 83.2%). An increased TK1 level (${\geq}15.2U/L$) correlated with the advanced clinical stage (P <0.001), bone marrow involvement (P =0.013), international prognostic index score (P =0.001), lactate dehydrogenase level (P =0.001), low Hb level (<12 g/dL) (P =0.028), and lymphocyte count (P =0.023). Conclusions: The serum TK1 level could serve as a useful biomarker for aggressive clinical behavior in B-cell lymphoma patients.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Communications and Information Sciences
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• v.35 no.6B
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• pp.962-969
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• 2010

Recently, RFID technology can successfully be used to reduce medical errors. This technology can aid in the accurate matching of patients with their medications and treatments. The enthusiasm for using RFID technology in medical settings has been tempered by privacy concerns. In this paper, we propose a secure and efficient RFID authentication system to not only authenticate patients' authenticity but also protect patients' personal medical informations. The proposed system consists of RFID-based patient authentication protocol and database security protocol. As a result, since the proposed RFID authentication system provides strong security and efficiency, it can be used practically for patient authentication and personal medical information protection on the high technology medical environments such as u-Hospital and u-Healthcare.

• Physical Therapy Korea
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.10-16
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• 1994

The purpose of this study was to establish a baseline in order that individuals may exercise safely. Sixty healthy students who were divided into two groups participated in the experiment. One group exercised both arms and legs at 60 rpm and the other at 90 rpm. There was a significant difference between arm and leg exercise in diastolic blood pressure (DBP) and time to target heart rate (tTHR). DBP decreased more in the upper (U//E) than the lower extremity (L/E), but tTHR increased more in the L/E than the U/E (p < 0.05). Systolic blood pressure (SBP) was similar for both arm and leg exercise (p > 0.05). There was also no significant difference between 60 rpm and 90 rpm in SBP, DBP or tTHR in either arm or leg exercise (p > 0.05). In conclusion, the slope of the linear increase in heart rate was steeper for U/E than L/E work. Therefore L/E exercise is safer than U/E exercise.

• Korea Journal of Hospital Management
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.103-111
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• 2020

Objectives: The study recognizes the seriousness of depression in youth with atopic dermatitis, and tries to identify factors that affect depression. Methods: Data were obtained from the 2014 Korean Youth Health Behavior Risk Behavior On-line Survey. In this study, 17,232 people who were Atopic dermatitis without missing variables were included in the final analysis. It conducted frequency, chi-square and logistic regression analysis by SPSS 20.0. Results: An analysis of factors affecting depression showed that subjective health level, subjective happiness satisfaction, subjective sleep satisfaction, subjective stress level, smoking, and drinking had an effect. Conclusions: The factors affecting youth depression with atopic dermatitis revealed health status, life behavior. These results are thought to require attention and research on youth with atopic dermatitis, along with the development of practical treatment programs and systematic management by applying them to teenagers in an appropriate time and method.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.5
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• pp.2649-2653
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• 2016

Background: Genetic alterations in gliomas have increasing importance for classification purposes. Thus, we are especially interested in studying IDH mutations which may feature potential roles in diagnosis, prognosis and response to treatment. Our aim was to investigate IDH mutations in diffuse glioma patients diagnosed in university hospital centre of Fez in Morocco. Materials and Methods: IDH1 codon 132 and IDH2 codon 172 were direct-sequenced in 117 diffuse glioma samples diagnosed and treated in University Hospital Hassan II between 2010 and 2014. Results: The R132H IDH1 mutation was identified in 43/117 tumor samples and R172K IDH2 mutation was detected in only one anaplastic oligodendroglioma. IDH mutations were observed in 63.2% of astrocytomas, 73.3% of diffuse oligodendrogliomas and 12.90% of glioblastomas. Conclusions: Our results confirmed other studies published earlier for other populations with some small discrepancies.