BACKGROUND: School age is a time when students form habits of healthy behavior that affect their lifetime health. However, most previous studies were conducted on hand washing and brushing teeth and no studies included bathing in personal hygiene. We aim to improve knowledge and performance about hand washing, brushing teeth, and bathing in school age children. The study was based on the health belief model and ways to establish proper personal hygiene habits. METHODS: A non-equivalent control group, pretest-posttest design was used in this study. The educational content included hand hygiene, oral hygiene and bath hygiene. After the pre and post evaluation of the control group, the experimental group received the education and pre and post evaluation over five weeks. Then, the education program was provided to the control group. This study was conducted over ten weeks from April to June 2017. RESULTS: Knowledge on personal hygiene habits (F=8.41, P=0.006) and performance of personal hygiene habits (F=29.09, P < 0.001) were higher in the experimental group compared to the control group after controlling the covariates. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study show obvious difference between the experimental group and control group on knowledge and performance for personal hygiene habits. This result demonstrated that the program based on the health belief model was effective. It is necessary to develop other effective programs including hand washing, brushing teeth, and bathing to help students develop good personal hygiene habits.
Baths ; Child ; Education ; Hand Disinfection ; Hand Hygiene ; Humans ; Hygiene ; Oral Hygiene ; Tooth

BACKGROUND: School age is a time when students form habits of healthy behavior that affect their lifetime health. However, most previous studies were conducted on hand washing and brushing teeth and no studies included bathing in personal hygiene. We aim to improve knowledge and performance about hand washing, brushing teeth, and bathing in school age children. The study was based on the health belief model and ways to establish proper personal hygiene habits. METHODS: A non-equivalent control group, pretest-posttest design was used in this study. The educational content included hand hygiene, oral hygiene and bath hygiene. After the pre and post evaluation of the control group, the experimental group received the education and pre and post evaluation over five weeks. Then, the education program was provided to the control group. This study was conducted over ten weeks from April to June 2017. RESULTS: Knowledge on personal hygiene habits (F=8.41, P=0.006) and performance of personal hygiene habits (F=29.09, P < 0.001) were higher in the experimental group compared to the control group after controlling the covariates. CONCLUSIONS The results of this study show obvious difference between the experimental group and control group on knowledge and performance for personal hygiene habits. This result demonstrated that the program based on the health belief model was effective. It is necessary to develop other effective programs including hand washing, brushing teeth, and bathing to help students develop good personal hygiene habits.

We conducted this cross-sectional study to elucidate factors that predict persistent smoking of the Korean cancer survivors. The subjects were 130 adult (> or =19 yr old) cancer survivors who were smokers at the diagnosis of cancer and have participated in the Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys conducted from 2007 to 2011. We categorized them into the persistent smokers and the quitters, according to change in smoking status between the time of cancer diagnosis and the time of the survey. Factors associated with persistent smoking were evaluated using the multiple logistic regression analysis. During 7.52 yr (standard deviation = 0.34) after the cancer diagnosis, 59.6% of the 130 cancer survivors have continued to smoke. After adjusting for covariates, following factors were independently associated with the risk of persistent smoking: female, low income, high-risk alcohol use, high body mass index (> or = 25 kg/m2), presence of household members who smoke, and longer duration of smoking. Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test showed a positive association with the risk of persistent smoking (P for trend = 0.012). In conclusion, more efforts for smoking cessation should be in place for the cancer survivors with those risk factors associated with the persistent smoking.
Adult ; Alcohol Drinking ; Cross-Sectional Studies ; Female ; *Health Behavior ; Humans ; Male ; Neoplasms/*mortality ; Republic of Korea/epidemiology ; Risk Factors ; Smoking/*epidemiology ; Smoking Cessation/psychology ; Surveys and Questionnaires ; Survivors/*psychology

Painful legs and moving toes syndrome (PLMT) is a rare syndrome characterized by pain in the lower extremities and involuntary movements of single or multiple toes. A 29-year-old woman with lumbosacral intervertebral disc herniation complained of bilateral foot pain and involuntary toe movements for three months. This is the first case of PLMT in a young adult patient with a lumbosacral intervertebral disc herniation in Korea.

Angiogenesis is important for the proliferation and survival of multiple myeloma (MM) cells. Bone marrow (BM) microvessel density (MVD) is a useful marker of angiogenesis and an increase in MVD can be used as a marker of poor prognosis in MM patients. We developed an automated image analyzer to assess MVD from images of BM biopsies stained with anti-CD34 antibodies using two color models. MVD was calculated by merging images from the red and hue channels after eliminating non-microvessels. The analyzer results were compared with those obtained by two experienced hematopathologists in a blinded manner using the 84 BM samples of MM patients. Manual assessment of the MVD by two hematopathologists yielded mean±SD values of 19.4±11.8 and 20.0±11.8. The analyzer generated a mean±SD of 19.5±11.2. The intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and Bland-Altman plot of the MVD results demonstrated very good agreement between the automated image analyzer and both hematopathologists (ICC=0.893 [0.840–0.929] and ICC=0.906 [0.859–0.938]). This automated analyzer can provide time- and labor-saving benefits with more objective results in hematology laboratories.