PURPOSE: There are several surgical methods for correcting a velopharyngeal insufficiency (VPI) but in some cases, it is not possible to achieve complete recovery of the velopharyngeal function. This paper introduces a new therapy for treating hypernasality without further surgery using continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP). METHODS: CPAP therapy was applied to seven VPI patients for eight weeks from April of 2007 to September of 2009. All patients underwent palatoplasty for the cleft palate and six patients underwent palatal lengthening for VPI before CPAP therapy. A speech pathologist performed an auditory perceptual evaluation to evaluate the improvement in hypernasality after 8-week CPAP therapy. RESULTS: Six patients showed an improvement in hypernasality after CPAP therapy according to the auditory perceptual evaluation. One patient with severe hypernasality responded to the early part of therapy but the hypernasality did not improve after therapy. CONCLUSION: CPAP therapy might be effective in reducing the hypernasality in patients with VPI by providing resistance training to strengthen the velopharyngeal closure muscles. In particular, CPAP therapy could be more effective for patients who show mild to moderate hypernasality after surgery.
Cleft Palate ; Continuous Positive Airway Pressure ; Humans ; Muscles ; Resistance Training ; Velopharyngeal Insufficiency

Mucoepidermoid carcinoma was initially recognized as occurring only in the salivary gland and only later was it appreciated that it occurred in the bronchus and trachea as well. Mucoepidermoid carcinoma of bronchial gland origin is extremely rare, and little is known about their natural history. This carcinoma is derived from the minor salivary gland of the proximal tracheobronchial tree and it is divided into low-grade and high-grade by gross, histologic, and ultrastructural criteria. Also Its clinical and biologic behaviors are closely related with histologic grade of carcinoma. We have experienced a rare case of bronchial mucoepidermoid carcinoma associated with adenocarinoma which obstructed the left main bronchus and was successfully removed by the pneumonectomy.
Adenocarcinoma ; Bronchi ; Carcinoma, Mucoepidermoid* ; Lung ; Natural History ; Pneumonectomy ; Salivary Glands ; Salivary Glands, Minor ; Trachea ; Trees

PURPOSE: This study was attempted to find out the actual conditions of drug education among the elementary school teachers. METHOD: 468 teachers consists of nurse-teachers 175, class-room teachers 240 and athletics teachers 53 of the elementary schools in Pusan city were subjected for this study. The period was December 23th through December 28th, 2002 and collected data was analyzed by SPSSWIN program using frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation and ANOVA. RESULT: The results of this study were as follows: 1. The average point of nurse-teachers performance(2.11) was higher than that of class-room teachers(1.37) and athletic teachers(1.56). 2. Practical difficulties of drug education was no system in the curriculum for nurse-teachers(22.9%), insufficient expert knowledge for class-room teachers(26.3%) and a lack of education materials for athletics teachers(37.7%). For more effective drug education, 25.7% of nurse-teachers hope to have more organized curriculum presentations, class-room teachers(24%) and athletics teachers(22.7%) hope that more various education materials will be developed. CONCLUSION: Based on this results, drug education contents is needed to supplement a drug use prevention program.
Busan ; Curriculum ; Education* ; Hope ; Humans ; Sports ; Child Health

CV(bDAT) cell line, expressing dopamine transporter stably, has been established by transfection of CV-1 cells with bovine dopamine transporter cDNA. Using CV(bDAT) cells, the effects of various antipsychotic drugs on dopamine uptake were investigated. All of antipsychotic drugs tested, inhibited the [3>H]dopamine uptake into CV(bDAT) cells with IC50s in the low to mid micromolar, implying that antipsychotic drugs may produce overflow of dopamine in the synaptic cleft of dopaminergic neuron.
Antipsychotic Agents* ; Cell Line ; DNA, Complementary ; Dopamine Plasma Membrane Transport Proteins* ; Dopamine* ; Dopaminergic Neurons ; Inhibitory Concentration 50 ; Transfection

BACKGROUND: Successful therapy for community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) requires appropriate empirical antimicrobial therapy based on the local microbe and resistance patterns. However, the available data on the bacterial etiology and antimicrobial susceptibility of CAP in Korea is very limited. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A nationwide prospective multicenter study of CAP in adult patients was carried out between March 2009 and February 2010. Most patients underwent detailed assessment for bacterial and viral pathogens (cultures, urinary antigen testing, serological methods and polymerase chain reaction). RESULTS: A total of 619 patients were studied. More than half (50.4%) of the patients were > or =65 years, 59.3% were males and 48.1% had underlying illness. The etiology was identified in 246 (39.7%) of the patients. The most common etiologic agent was Streptococcus pneumoniae (52 episodes, 21.1%), and the majority (36/52) of which were diagnosed by a positive urinary antigen test alone. The other common bacterial agents included Mycoplasma pneumoniae (41, 16.7%), Klebsiella pneumoniae (26, 10.6%), Chlamydia pneumoniae (13, 5.3%), Pseudomonas aeruginosa (11, 4.3%) and Staphylococcus aureus (8, 3.1%). All S. pneumoniae isolates were susceptible to penicillin with MIC of 2 microg/mL or less, only 1/16 (6.2%) was resistant to levofloxacin and 10/16 (62.5%) were resistant to erythromycin. Of the 26 K. pneumoniae isolates, 25 (96.2%) were susceptible to cefotaxime and ciprofloxacin. CONCLUSIONS: S. pneumoniae remains the most frequent pathogen in adults with CAP and this should be covered with empirical antimicrobial treatment. Atypical pathogens such as M. pneumoniae and C. pneumoniae were the second most common etiologic agents and they should be tested for. The rate of CAP caused by gram-negative bacilli such as K. pneumoniae and P. aeruginosa was high, which is similar to that of the previous Korean studies. Further study, with excluding healthcare-associated pneumonia, is needed to clarify the etiology of CAP in Korea.
Adult ; Cefotaxime ; Chlamydophila pneumoniae ; Erythromycin ; Humans ; Klebsiella pneumoniae ; Korea ; Male ; Mycoplasma pneumoniae ; Ofloxacin ; Penicillins ; Pneumonia ; Pneumonia, Bacterial ; Pneumonia, Mycoplasma ; Prospective Studies ; Pseudomonas aeruginosa ; Staphylococcus aureus ; Streptococcus pneumoniae

In the present study, the signs of airflow obstruction on inspiratory and expiratory CT scans in 45 patients with rheumatoid arthritis were investigated. Radiologic findings were evaluated and correlated with the clinical data, which included rheumatoid factors and pulmonary function tests results. A lung biopsy was performed in five patients. The pattern of CT findings was as follows: infiltrative (n=15), obstructive (n=12), mixed (infiltrative and obstructive; n=10), other complicating diseases (n=7), and normal (n=1). The rheumatologic factor between patients with bronchial wall thickenings and patients without thickenings was significantly different (p=0.009). The forced expiratory flow rate between 25% and 75% of the vital capacity (FEF25-75%) was significantly more reduced in patients with interlobular septal thickenings than in patients without these thickenings. The patients with mosaic attenuation had significantly lower mean values of FEF25-75% (p=0.001) and a lower peak expiratory flow (p=0.003) than patients without mosaic attenuation. On expiratory scans, the mean air-trapping score was 21%. These air-trapping scores were found to be well correlated with FEV1/FVC (r=0.230, p=0.0452), and FEF25-75% (r=-0.63, p= 0.05). It is widely known that a relatively higher percentage of mosaic attenuation with air-trapping and a good correlation between these and functional values contribute to the detection of early airway obstruction in patients with rheumatoid arthritis, and even in patients with infiltrative lung disease only.
Adolescent ; Adult ; Aged ; Airway Obstruction/*epidemiology/physiopathology/*radiography ; Arthritis, Rheumatoid/*epidemiology ; Female ; Forced Expiratory Flow Rates ; Human ; Incidence ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Peak Expiratory Flow Rate ; *Respiratory Function Tests ; *Tomography, X-Ray Computed ; Vital Capacity

Brucellosis is a world-wide zoonotic disease. We report the first case of brucellosis in South Korea that is not related to direct contract with intected cattles. The patient had been working in the market of by-product, stock raising for twenty years and complained of 1-month history of fever, chill, and intermittent epistaxis. We confirmed brucellosis by anti-brucella antibody test and PCR. After 6 weeks' treatment with rifampicin and doxycycline, fever and chilling subsided, and, generalized weakness and oral intake improved. We performed seroepidemiology study against workers who were working in the same market as the patient. However, we couldn't find out other cases with seropositivity. We concluded that although the workers of by-product market have a risk of getting brucellosis, the risk is low.
Animals* ; Brucellosis* ; Doxycycline ; Epistaxis ; Fever ; Humans* ; Korea ; Polymerase Chain Reaction ; Rifampin ; Zoonoses

Brucellosis is a world-wide zoonotic disease. We report the first case of brucellosis in South Korea that is not related to direct contract with intected cattles. The patient had been working in the market of by-product, stock raising for twenty years and complained of 1-month history of fever, chill, and intermittent epistaxis. We confirmed brucellosis by anti-brucella antibody test and PCR. After 6 weeks' treatment with rifampicin and doxycycline, fever and chilling subsided, and, generalized weakness and oral intake improved. We performed seroepidemiology study against workers who were working in the same market as the patient. However, we couldn't find out other cases with seropositivity. We concluded that although the workers of by-product market have a risk of getting brucellosis, the risk is low.
Animals* ; Brucellosis* ; Doxycycline ; Epistaxis ; Fever ; Humans* ; Korea ; Polymerase Chain Reaction ; Rifampin ; Zoonoses

Most submucosal tumors of the stomach are of mesenchymal origin. Gastric schwannoma, which is a subset of mesenchymal tumors, is a rare tumor taking origin from Schwann's cells. A 61-year-old woman whose endoscopy showed a well circumscribed submucosal mass measuring 2.5 cm on the midbody of the stomach. Endosonographically, the tumor was well circumscribed, low echoic submucosal mass with cystic lesion in the 4th layer of the gastric wall. The patient underwent wedge resection. Microscopically, the cells were made up of irregular fasciculating bundles of spindle cells featured with benign nuclear atypia and peripheral lymphoid cell cuffing, involving muscularis propria. Immunohistochemical staining showed positivity for S-100 protein and the neuron-specific enolase, but were negative to CD 34, desmin and smooth muscle actin. From these findings, this tumor was diagnosed as a schwannoma.
Actins ; Desmin ; Endoscopy ; Female ; Humans ; Lymphocytes ; Middle Aged ; Muscle, Smooth ; Neurilemmoma* ; Phosphopyruvate Hydratase ; S100 Proteins ; Stomach

We report results on the seroprevalence of antibodies to Coxiella burnetii in cattle and healthy people in Korea. Upon agreement with dairy owners, serum samples from 414 dairy cattle were collected between March and June 2001 and samples from 205 people for health screening were collected between April and December 2002. The sera were analyzed for the presence of anti-C. burnetii phase II antibodies using an indirect microimmunofluorescence test; strong fluorescence at a 1:32 dilution was regarded as positive. The overall seroprevalence of C. burnetii in cattle in Korea was 25.6%, with regional variation from 8.9 to 59.3%. Of the positive serum samples, 75.5% had antibody titers > or =1:256. By contrast, only 1.5% of people in a rural area were seropositive, and most of the positive samples had low antibody titers. In conclusion, this study showed that relatively high seropositivity of C. burnetii in dairy cattle, accordingly, the studies on the high-risk groups are needed to evaluate the seroprevalence for this organism in Korea.
Seroepidemiologic Studies ; Retrospective Studies ; Q Fever/*epidemiology/veterinary ; Middle Aged ; Male ; Humans ; Female ; Coxiella burnetii/*immunology ; Cattle Diseases/*epidemiology ; Cattle ; Antibodies, Bacterial/*blood ; Animals ; Aged, 80 and over ; Aged ; Adult