Along with the heightened interest of the general public in health in the midst of an increase in life expectancy in Korea, television programs covering health and medical issues are gaining attention. Health and medical television programs have increased in number as well as type of format, due to the advent of comprehensive programming television channels in 2011. Television stations have succeeded in capturing viewers' attention through their addition of entertainment elements to health programs. As a result, health and medical programs on television lack accuracy or are filled with overstatements and distortions of information. Therefore, a system is required to verify that the information on health and medical programs is reliable and accurate rather than concentrated only on entertainment or commercialism.
Korea ; Life Expectancy ; Television*

BACKGROUND: As the elderly population grows and increasing average life expectancy, medical needs and utilization by elderly people are rapid increase in recent years. It is thus essential that elderly people are included in clinical studies. There are also needed the standardization of age grouping and guideline of the elderly for the purpose of relative review between studies. And a study must include what age was used as a cut off value. So we set out to discover age grouping, cut off ages and guideline age of the elderly in two major Korean medical journals. METHODS: We examined all original research papers in all the issues of the Korean Journal of Medicine (KJM), and the Journal of The Korean Surgical Society (JKSS) between January 1995 and December 1997. We excluded animal works and papers concerned with special age (children, soldiers). Of the remaining 931 (386 KJM/545 JKSS) papers, we reviewed how many papers included elderly people in them, age grouping and regularity, age group intervals, cut off age, and of the specific to the elderly papers, what age was used as guideline age of the elderly. RESULTS: Of the reviewed 931 papers, included above 60-year were 701 (75.3%), excluded were 166 (17.8%), and no age limit was set in 64 (6.9%) papers. Of the 701 papers that included above 60 years, no age grouping were 349 (49.8%), and 352 (50.2%) had age grouping. Among them, 341 papers used regular intervals, while 11 papers used irregular intervals. Of the 341 regular age interval papers, five year interval were 4, ten year were 322, fifteen year were 2, and twenty year were 13. The cut off age as a specific value were 118, and cut off as a group of ages were 223. Ten papers were specifically about elderly people. Of these papers, the guidelines of the elderly were 60-year in 6, and 65-year in 4 papers. CONCLUSION: Many Korean medical papers included above 60-year people. But near half of them had no age grouping, and no age limit sets were 6.9%. And there were mixed use of 60 and 65 years for guideline of the elderly. So more elderly people should be included in future clinical studies. The standardization of age grouping and guideline of the elderly are also needed.
Aged* ; Animals ; Humans ; Life Expectancy

Based on the integration of concept and methods of cause-eliminated life expectancy (CELE), health-adjusted life expectancy (HALE) and disability-adjusted life year (DALY), a new index named cause-excluded health adjusted life expectancy (CEHALE) was developed in this study to evaluate the health impact(both fetal and non-fetal) of single disease. In order to include the impact of both premature death and health problems among those who are alive, the concept of suppositional death was introduced to calculate CEHALE. Cause-excluded health adjusted life expectancy developed in this study, should be not only easy to understand in concept, but also has theoretical support and be not affected by age structure, and be more suitable to use in comparison among different diseases and different population. Moreover, the new index is easy to calculate. So, CEHALE should be an ideal index to evaluate the impact of disease to population health.
Cost of Illness ; Humans ; Life Expectancy

OBJECTIVETo provide an easy computational tool for evaluating the health condition of local residents.

METHODSAn abridged life table was programmed by applying mathematical functions and formula in Excel program and tested with the real study data to evaluate the results computed.

RESULTSThe Excel was capable of computing group death probability of age in the life table ((n)q(x)), number of survivors (l(x)), number of death ((n)d(x)), survival per person-year ((n)L(x)), survival total per person-year (T(x)) and life expectancy (e(x)). The calculated results were consistent with those by SAS.

CONCLUSIONThe abridged life table constructed using Microsoft Excel can conveniently and accurately calculate the relevant indices for evaluating the health condition of the residents.

Cause of Death ; Humans ; Life Expectancy ; Mathematics ; Quality of Life ; Value of Life

International research on healthy life expectancy (HALE) focuses on inequality of socioeconomic status and individual natural attributes. With the acceleration of population ageing and the increase in average life expectancy, the extension of unhealthy life expectancy and the increase of social and economic burden caused by diseases have gradually attracted the attention of countries around the world. Therefore, the evaluation of disease factors affecting HALE is a meaningful direction in the future. This study introduces the development process and commonly used measurement methods of HALE. According to the definition of health from the Global Burden of Disease Study and World Health Organization, physical and mental diseases such as cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, chronic respiratory diseases, diabetes, malignant tumors and depression were selected to summarize the impact of these diseases and pre-disease states on HALE. It is expected to provide a theoretical basis for the formulation of relevant public health policies and the improvement of quality of life in China.
Humans ; Healthy Life Expectancy ; Quality of Life ; Life Expectancy ; Causality ; Social Class

Patients with pain syndromes resulting from recurrent or metastatic cancer should be evaluated carefully to determine the cause of their pain and the need for appropriate antitumor treatment. The most effective ablative pain control procedure at the current time is cordotomy, which is indicated in patients with unilateral pain. The authors results of 12 antero-lateral thoracic cordotomies performed for intractable cancer pain between 1996-1998. The follow-up of these patients was continued for at least 12 months or until death to determine the late success of this procedure. Excellent surgical results were obtained in 100% after one week and in 50% in 6 months after operation. The operation was considered to be successful for patients with malignant disease of short life expectancy.
Cordotomy* ; Follow-Up Studies ; Humans ; Life Expectancy

Lumbar microdiscectomy (MD) is the gold standard for treatment of lumbar disc herniation. Generally, the surgeon attempts to protect the facet joint in hopes of avoiding postoperative pain/instability and secondary degenerative arthropathy. We believe that preserving the facet joint is especially important in young patients, owing to their life expectancy and activity. However, preserving the facet joint is not easy during lumbar MD. We propose several technical tips (superolateral extension of conventional laminotomy, oblique drilling for laminotomy, and additional foraminotomy) for facet joint preservation during lumbar MD.
Foraminotomy ; Humans ; Laminectomy ; Life Expectancy ; Zygapophyseal Joint*

Endoscopic palliative biliary drainage is considered as a gold standard treatment in advanced or inoperable hilar cholangiocarcinoma. Also, metal stents are preferred over plastic stents in patients with >3 months life expectancy. However, the endoscopic intervention of advanced hilar obstruction is often more challenging and complex than that of distal malignant biliary obstructions. In this literature review, we describe the issues commonly encountered during endoscopic unilateral (single) versus bilateral (multiple) biliary stenting for malignant hilar obstruction. Also, we provide technical guidance to improve the technical success rates and patient outcomes, focusing on bilateral metallic stenting techniques such as stent-in-stent or side-by-side deployment.
Cholangiocarcinoma ; Drainage ; Humans ; Life Expectancy ; Plastics ; Stents*

Percutaneous cordotomy is a useful method for cancer pain management. Candidates for cervical cordotomy include those patients with unilateral cancer pain below the shoulder, with a life expectancy of less than 1 year, who can not be adequately treated by other less invasive methods. However, various complications can occur following a cordotomy, with the most serious being respiratory dysfunction. Herein, we report a case of transient respiratory dysfunction following a percutaneous cervical cordotomy.
Cordotomy* ; Humans ; Life Expectancy ; Pain Management ; Shoulder