Worldwide, aged population has been rising since the Second World War. Developed countries have already taken measures to confront various problems brought by the phenomenon. Korea, with its population aging faster than any other countries, is developing national plans of action as well. The Korean government developed several strategies comprising long-term care insurance policies. In 2004, it attempted to newly recognize geriatric medicine as a specialty, but the efforts were futile in the face of medical societies seeking interests. Established in 1968, the Korean Geriatric Society reached 6,000 members in 2010. It has been decided that the 20th International Association of Gerontology and Geriatrics World Congress of Gerontology and Geriatrics in 2013 will be held in Seoul. Despite the circumstances, medical colleges are still failing to provide enough education on geriatric medicine, and geriatricians are not playing critical roles in caring elderly individuals in Korea. As the population is aging more rapidly, we will be facing numerous obstacles in maintaining the present society. It is imperative that the government recognize geriatric medicine as a major specialty to meet the demands of our future society. We hope that geriatricians will eventually take major actions to confront the health problems of the aged population and contribute not only to education of medical students but also to training of medical doctors in preparation for the near coming future.
Aged ; Aging ; Developed Countries ; Geriatrics ; Humans ; Insurance, Long-Term Care ; Korea ; Societies, Medical ; Students, Medical ; World War II

BACKGROUND: Obesity is known to influence on physical, mental, functional health problems but there have been no study of relationship between body mass index (BMI) and quality of life (QOL) in Korean elderly. METHODS: A total of 216 elderly who had been attending two geriatric welfare facilities in Seoul answered the Korean version of obesity-related quality of life (KOQOL) questionnaire. Height, weight, waist circumference were measured. Body fat (%) was measured with HTM20 by impedance technique. Sociodemographic and medical factors were interviewed. QOL was assessed using KOQOL (ver.1) after excluding two sexual life related questions and one work related question. The total score is 48 points. The higher is the score, the poorer is the QOL. RESULTS: In multivariable analysis, BMI, age, history of diabetes mellitus, history of osteoarthritis were associated with KOQOL score. Especially, BMI was significantly associated with KOQOL score after adjusting for waist circumference, body fat (%) (P = 0.002). CONCLUSION: The more BMI increases, the worse the obesity related QOL is in Korean ambulatory elderly.
Adipose Tissue ; Adult ; Aged ; Body Mass Index ; Diabetes Mellitus ; Electric Impedance ; Humans ; Obesity ; Osteoarthritis ; Quality of Life ; Waist Circumference ; Surveys and Questionnaires

OBJECTIVES: The objectives of this study were to explore the association between shift work and the bone mineral density in a representative sample of Korean workers. METHODS: He data from the Fourth Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (2008-2009) was used. The participants were Korean workers aged 16 to 60 years. Logistic regression analysis was applied to determine the association between shift work and the bone mineral density after controlling for covariates using the SAS version 9.3 package program. RESULTS: The blood vitamin D level in shift workers was significantly lower than that of day workers in both males and females. In male shift workers, shift work was significantly associated with a decreased bone mineral density in the femoral neck (odds ratio(OR) 1.42, 95% confidence interval(CI)=1.05~1.92) and lumbar spine (OR 1.53, 95% CI=1.09~2.15) compared to day workers. After controlling for covariates, this association was still significant. In the case of female shift workers, shift work was significantly related to a decreased bone mineral density in the total femur (OR 2.84, 95% CI=1.69~4.79) and lumbar spine (OR 1.58, 95% CI=1.12~2.24). After controlling for covariates, this risk was not statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS: The blood vitamin D level of shift workers was significantly lower than that of day workers. In male shift workers, shift work can decrease the bone mineral density in the femoral neck and lumbar spine. Prospective studies with information on the shift work intensity and duration and exposuredata to explain mechanisms will be needed.
Aged ; Bone Density ; Female ; Femur ; Femur Neck ; Humans ; Logistic Models ; Male ; Nutrition Surveys ; Phenothiazines ; Spine ; Vitamin D ; Work Schedule Tolerance

OBJECTIVES: The present study was designed to determine the characteristics of shift work and the relationship between shift work and the level of self-rated health using the Korean Labor and Income Panel Study (KLIPS) data, which represents urban households in Korea. METHODS: Using the 9th wave of KLIPS, this study analyzed 2,087 male workers aged 25 to 64 years; participants missing data were excluded from analysis. To determine the impact of shift work on the level of self-rated health, logistic regression analysis was applied that controlled for socio-demographic characteristics, labor environment, and health-related behaviors. RESULTS: Shift workers comprised 13.4% of study subjects overall. The majority(69.2%) of participants were in 2-teams and in 2-shifts. Week 1 shift cycle changes were the highest, 56.3%. The risk of poor self-rated health was not significantly higher among shift workers compared to non-shift workers (OR=1.08, 95% CI=0.79~1.48). When divided by tenure, shift workers with more than 10-years experience (OR=1.79, 95% CI=0.91~3.50) tended to show greater risk than non-shift workers at marginal significance. CONCLUSIONS: In the present study, a significantly higher risk of self-rated poor health among shift workers was not observed. However, shift workers with more than 10-years experience tended to show increased health risk compared to non-shift workers. Further studies are required to determine time-series data and to consider both healthy worker effect and information bias.
Aged ; Bias (Epidemiology) ; Family Characteristics ; Healthy Worker Effect ; Humans ; Korea ; Logistic Models ; Male

Regular exercise and a certain level of physical activity reduce the mortality rate in the elderly. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of physical activity on the prevention of fracture in the middle aged or older in Korea. The basic data are based on the Ansan and Ansung community cohort studies of the Korean Genome and Epidemiology Study conducted by the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2001, and the fracture data from the third survey in 2005 to the sixth survey in 2011. The physical activity of the aged in the 40s was mostly distributed in the World Health Organization (WHO) recommended range of 7.5 to 30.0 metabolic equivalent·hr/wk, and the activity was gradually divided into the low and high groups in the 50s and 60s. In the 60s, the risk of fracture was reduced to 0.63 times compared to that of the 50s when physical activity was the recommended level (odds ratio, 0.63; p<0.001). For Korean adults, there was no significant difference in fracture incidence according to the amount of physical activity in the middle-aged people. However, for the elderly aged 60 and over, the risk of fracture decreased when the WHO recommended level of activity was performed, and the risk increased when less or more activities were performed.
Adult* ; Aged ; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (U.S.) ; Cohort Studies* ; Epidemiology ; Fractures, Bone ; Genome ; Gyeonggi-do ; Humans ; Incidence ; Korea ; Middle Aged ; Mortality ; Motor Activity* ; World Health Organization

BACKGROUND: There has been a rapid increase in the number of part-time workers in Korea with little information available on associated changes in quality of life. This study was designed to compare part-time and full-time workers in terms of the quality of life and related factors. METHODS: Data were extracted from the 4th Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, conducted in 2008. Of the 1,284 participants selected, 942 were females (range, 20 to 64 years). Based on the information provided by self-administered questionnaire, subjects were categorized according to the working pattern (full-time and part-time) and working hours (<30 and > or =30 hours). Differences in socio-demographic characteristics, health-related behaviors, and job characteristics were assessed by t-test and chi-square test. EuroQol-five dimensions (EQ-5D) index was implemented in order to measure the quality of life. Differences in the EQ-5D index scores between the groups were compared by t-test, stepwise multivariate logistic regression analyses. RESULTS: Quality of life did not differ by work patterns. In males, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development part-time group was associated with poorer quality of life (odds ratio [OR], 0.49; P = 0.028). For both sexes, the non-stress group was linked with superior quality of life in comparison to the stress group (OR, 2.64; P = 0.002; OR, 2.17; P < 0.001). Female employees engaged in non-manual labor had superior quality of life than those engaged in manual labor (OR, 1.40; P = 0.027). CONCLUSION: This study concludes that working less than 30 hours per week is related to lower quality of life in comparison to working 30 hours or more in male employees in Korea.
Female ; Health Surveys ; Humans ; Korea ; Logistic Models ; Male ; Nutrition Surveys ; Quality of Life ; Surveys and Questionnaires

BACKGROUND: This study is aimed at finding out the relationship between long working hours, one of major job stress elements, and hearing impairment in unexposed workers to occupational and environmental noise. METHODS: This study was performed on 1628 regular, full-time wage workers between the age of 25-64 who indicated in the survey of having no experience of exposure to noise, normal otoscopic findings, and not suffering from diabetes based on the data from the fifth Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHANES 2010–2012). The average working hours per week was categorized into 40 h and lower group, more than 40 to 48 h group, more than 48 to 60 h group, and more than 60 h group. The groups were defined as suffering from low or high frequencies hearing impairment if the average hearing threshold for 0.5, 1, 2 kHz or 3, 4, 6 kHz in both ears exceeds 25 dB based on the pure tone audiometry. The association between average weekly working hours and hearing impairment was analyzed using logistic regression after gender stratification. RESULTS: The prevalences of low and high frequencies hearing impairment in male workers were 4.3 and 28.6 %, respectively, which were much higher than female’s prevalence of 2.7 and 11.1 %. For male workers, no significant association was found between average weekly working hours and low and high frequencies hearing impairment. For female workers, odds ratios (OR) of low and high frequencies hearing impairment were 4.22 (95 % confidence interval (CI) 1.09–16.27) and 4.49 (95 % CI 1.73–11.67), respectively, after controlling for several related factors, such as, age, Body Mass Index (BMI), socio-economic status, health-related behavioral, and occupational characteristics variables, in the final model in the group working more than 60 h compared to the group working 40 h and lower. In addition, a dose-response relationship was observed that ORs of low and high frequencies hearing impairment were increased according to increasing average weekly working hours. CONCLUSIONS: The association between long working hours and hearing impairment in both low and high frequencies was significant in Korean female workers with a dose-response relationship. Therefore, the law to change the culture of long working hours should be enacted in order to protect the workers’ health and improve the quality of life in Korean workers.
Audiometry ; Body Mass Index ; Ear ; Female ; Hearing Loss* ; Hearing* ; Humans ; Jurisprudence ; Korea* ; Logistic Models ; Male ; Noise* ; Nutrition Surveys* ; Odds Ratio ; Prevalence ; Quality of Life ; Salaries and Fringe Benefits

BACKGROUND: Previous studies on the association between shift or night work and weight change have been focused on finding the risk of weight gain caused by shift or night work. In this study, we aimed to reveal the risk of weight gain and weight loss associated with night work by using a nationwide representative data. METHODS: This study was performed on 1605 full-time wage workers between the age of 20 and 69 based on the fifth Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHANES 2010–2012). The association between night work and involuntary weight change in the previous year was divided into the categories of weight gain and weight loss and studied with modifications in socio-demographic variables, health behavior-related variables, and occupational characteristic variables. RESULTS: The participants working in night work accounted for 10.6 % of total study participants (male; 11.9 %, female 7.4 %). Workers who worked more than 48 hours per week on average accounted for 41.6 % of the total study participants (male; 46.3 %, female 29.1 %). Odds ratio (OR) of weight loss associated with night work in male workers was 0.34 (95 % confidence interval (CI) 0.16–0.76) after controlling for several related factors. OR of weight loss associated with night work in female workers with long working hours was 1.95 (95 % CI 0.47–80.86) and that of weight gain was 2.83 (95 % CI 0.12–69.83) after adjusting associated factors. CONCLUSIONS: In this cross-sectional study with national representative sample, night work may lower the risk of weight loss in male workers and induce weight change (weight loss or weight gain) in female workers with long working hours. Therefore, future studies with cohort study design for night workers are needed to reveal the mechanisms and health effects of weight change associated with night work and establish proper management solutions with health and labor policies for Korean night workers.
Cohort Studies ; Cross-Sectional Studies ; Female ; Humans ; Korea* ; Male ; Nutrition Surveys* ; Odds Ratio ; Salaries and Fringe Benefits ; Weight Gain ; Weight Loss

BACKGROUND: The association between daily protein intake and osteoporosis is still controversial and only a few studies have explored the issue in Korea. This study investigated the relationship between daily protein intake and the prevalence of osteoporosis in Korean adults. METHODS: This study analyzed data extracted from the Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 4. Participants were aged 19 years or older and had never been treated for osteoporosis. The percentage of calories coming from protein intake was assessed by 24-hour recall method, and participants were divided into three groups according to recommended daily dietary protein intake as a proportion of total daily calories (i.e., <10%, 10%-20%, and >20%). A lumbar or femur neck bone mineral density T-score less than -2.5 was indicative of the presence osteoporosis. The influence of daily protein intake on the prevalence of osteoporosis was analyzed. RESULTS: In both sexes, the group with the highest protein intake had significantly lower odds of developing lumber osteoporosis when compared to the group with the lowest protein intake, after adjusting for associated factors (females: odds ratio [OR], 0.618; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.610 to 0.626; P for trend <0.001; males: OR, 0.695; 95% CI, 0.685 to 0.705; P for trend <0.001). CONCLUSION: Sufficient daily protein intake lowered the prevalence of osteoporosis in Korean adults. Further prospective studies are necessary to verify the preventive effect of adequate protein intake on osteoporosis.
Adult ; Aged ; Bone Density ; Dietary Proteins ; Femur Neck ; Humans ; Korea ; Nutrition Surveys ; Odds Ratio ; Osteoporosis ; Prevalence ; Proteins

BACKGROUND: This study was aimed at finding out the exposure level of bisphenol A (BPA), a well-known endocrine disruptor, in relation to dietary factors using a data representing the Korean general population. METHODS: This study was performed on 5402 adults aged 19 years and older based on the Second Korean National Environmental Health Survey (KoNEHS 2012–2014). The data analyzed urinary BPA concentration in relation to socio-demographic variables, health behavior-related variables, and dietary factor-related variables. Odds ratio (OR) was calculated through a logistic regression analysis after dividing the participants into high BPA exposure group and low BPA exposure group based on the top 75 percentile concentration. The logistic regression analysis was carried out considering the appropriate sample weight, stratification, and clustering of the second KoNEHS sample design. RESULTS: The group drinking bottled water at home and the group using zip-top bags/plastic bags showed significantly higher urinary BPA concentration in female. OR tends to increase as the intake frequency of frozen food increased and OR of frozen food consumption of more than once a week was 1.48 (95% confidence interval (CI) 1.02–2.24) for male and the group drinking bottled water showed significantly higher OR of 1.45 (95% CI 1.06–2.17) after adjusting the related factors for female. CONCLUSIONS: BPA levels were high in female using bottled water and in male consuming frozen food, and therefore bottled water and frozen food need to be avoided to reduce BPA levels.
Adult ; Drinking ; Drinking Water ; Environmental Health* ; Female ; Frozen Foods ; Humans ; Logistic Models ; Male ; Odds Ratio