Journal of Korean medical science
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J. Korean Med. Sci. · Jun 2014
The Korean version of the trauma symptom checklist for children: psychometric properties and the connection to trauma among Korean children and adolescents.
The purpose of the present study was to develop a Korean version of the trauma symptom checklist for children (TSCC) and to examine its reliability and validity for screening posttraumatic stress symptoms. A normative group of 405 children and adolescents aged 8 to 16 yr participated in the study. A test-retest procedure was conducted with 76 participants from the normative group after 4 weeks. ⋯ Confirmatory 6-factor analysis explained 51.1% of the variance. Other measures such as concurrent or discriminative validity were also shown to be satisfactory. In conclusion, the Korean version of TSCC has been shown to be a screening instrument with satisfactory psychometric qualities that is capable of identifying trauma symptoms among children and adolescents who have self-reported experiencing trauma or for whom clinicians have identified traumatic experiences.
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J. Korean Med. Sci. · Jun 2014
An early stage evaluation of the Supporting Program for Obstetric Care Underserved Areas in Korea.
"The Supporting Program for Obstetric Care Underserved Areas (SPOU)" provides financial aids to rural community (or district) hospitals to reopen prenatal care and delivery services for regions without obstetrics and gynecology clinics or hospitals. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the early stage effect of the SPOU program. The proportion of the number of birth through SPOU was calculated by each region. ⋯ Short distance and easy accessibility was the main reason among women choosing community (or district) hospital whereas the reasons of not selecting the community (or district) hospital were favor of the outside hospital's facility, system, and trust in the medical staffs. The SPOU seems to be currently effective at an early stage. However, to successfully implement this program, the government should make continuous efforts to recruit highly qualified medical staffs and improve medical facility and equipment.
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J. Korean Med. Sci. · Jun 2014
The effect of body mass index on survival in advanced epithelial ovarian cancer.
Controversy remains regarding the effect of obesity on the survival of patients with ovarian cancer in Asia. This study examined the impact of obesity on the survival outcomes in advanced epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC) using Asian body mass index (BMI) criteria. The medical records of patients undergoing surgery for advanced (stage III and IV) EOC were reviewed. ⋯ We found that underweight BMI and surgical optimality are independent risk factors for the survival of patients with advanced ovarian cancer. High BMI groups (overweight, obese I and II) are not associated with the survival of advanced EOC patient. However, in the subgroup of EOC patients with serous histology and after optimal operation, overweight and obese I group patients show better survival than the normal weight group patients.
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The purpose of this study was to discuss the history of, and concerns regarding, the newly amended criteria of occupational cerebrovascular or cardiovascular diseases (CCVDs). Since the early 1990s, CCVDs have been the second most common occupational disease, despite fluctuations in their criteria. The first issue was the deletion of cerebral hemorrhage on duty as a recognized occupational disease in 2008. ⋯ If the average number of weekly working hours does not exceed 60 hr, night work, physical or psychological workload, or other risk factors should be considered for the recognition of occupational CCVDs. However, these newly amended criteria still have a few limitations, considering that there is research evidence for the occurrence of disease in those working fewer than 60 hr per week, and other risk factors, particularly night work, are underestimated in these criteria. Thus, we suggest that these concerns be actively considered during future amendment and approval processes.
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The Korean list of occupational skin diseases was amended in July 2013. The past list was constructed according to the causative agent and the target organ, and the items of that list had not been reviewed for a long period. The revised list was reconstructed to include diseases classified by the International Classification of Diseases (10th version). ⋯ The revised list is in accordance with the International Labor Organization list and is refined according to Korean worker's compensation and the actual occurrence of occupational skin diseases. However, this revised list does not perfectly reflect the actual status of skin diseases because of the few cases of occupational skin diseases, incomplete statistics of skin diseases, and insufficient scientific evidence. Thus, the list of occupational diseases should be modified periodically on the basis of recent evidence and statistics.