Since surgical bone banks were set up at several university hospitals in early 1970s, the number of allograft is getting increased in Korean society. Most orthopedic surgeons have used allografts supplied by their own surgical bone banks for tumor reconstruction, arthroplasty, and ligament reconstruction. In 2000, a nation-wide survey for surgical bone banks was performed by Korean orthopedic Association. The questionnaires were prepared by the Committee on Tissue Bank in the Association, and sent to 110 university and training hospitals. Fifty-six surgical bone banks were encountered. However, facilities of the banks were not updated. Most of them were using one or two deep freezers only. Most of them do not have a full-time technician. While most bone banks were using surgically excised femoral heads and amputated limbs, some banks retrieved the tissues from cadaver or organ donors. Since the law for organ transplantation from brain death was established in February 2000, the number of allograft transplantation is growing tremendously. In order to secure the safety of allograft transplantation, the enactment of "the Law for Tissue Transplantation" is mandatory. Unlike organs, the tissues can be procured and stored in advance and can be used whenever they are needed by establishing and operating a form of tissue bank. Therefore, since it is difficult to regulate or supervise tissue banking by "the Law on the Organs and Transplantation", the enactment of a separate law is highly recommended. The government should set the certification standards for the bone and tissue banks suitable for the domestic circumstances. The request of certification of bone and tissue banks should be obtained by the banks that are currently in operation. Also, actual inspection team should be organized involving the professionals and public officers. This team will be responsible for audit of the banks. The certified bone and tissue banks should renew by paper review or actual inspection every 2~3 years. For safe and smooth operation of the banks, the licence system for certified tissue bank specialist(CTBS) should be adopted. Requirements such as academic requirement or professional experience in bone and tissue banks for a certain period of time will be needed.
Allografts ; Arthroplasty ; Bone Banks* ; Brain Death ; Cadaver ; Certification ; Extremities ; Head ; Hospitals, University ; Humans ; Jurisprudence ; Korea* ; Ligaments ; Organ Transplantation ; Orthopedics ; Quality Improvement* ; Surgeons ; Tissue Banks ; Tissue Donors ; Transplants

A study on the health care of Ewha Woman's University staff, faculty and families was conducted during the period from March 1973 to August 1974 using designed questionnaire. The response rates were 96.0%. The results and findings obtained from the study are summarized as follow. 1. The sex ration of the members the faculty and the staff shows 83.2% and the singles are 37.2% of the total. Their mean family size being 4.6 periods per capita, each family has mean number of 2.3 children. 2. The median monthly income of a member of faculty amounts won114,000 and that of a staff won43,077. It amounts won79,333 when the median monthly income of both the members of the faculty and the staff are taken. Consequently, it amounts won91,727 per family (Assumed mean). 3. 71.4% of the total hold the house of their own. A spouses of 59.4% of them are working for the additional income of the family. 4. Their health condition is rated fair, i.e. 92.3% of them enjoy good health. Out of total members faculty and the staff, 20.6% are cared by family physician. 36.2% of them feel that they are burdened by heavy medical expense. 5. 76.7% of them have affirmatively responded that they would purchase medical insurance policy when they were offered. It reaches 84.0% of the total who consider buying the policy for their dependents. 74.0% of them desire to purchase the policy for their spouse's parents. 6. The monthly prevalence rate reaches 17.0% and the hospital admission rate 4.7%. 12.3% of them affirmatively responded that they had chronic disease. The number of sick call per capita counts 0.2 per month and the hospital admission rate 0.05. 7. To examine the nature of their disease, the respiratory disease is rated to be the top and the gastro-intestinal disease comes to the next. As far as chronic disease is concerned, the gastro-intestinal disease is predominant. 8. As to their treatment, 65.4% of them get the physician's treatment and 17.0% treatment of drug purchasing and 7.7% prefer Chinese drug. 6.6% of them gets no medical treatment at all. 9. The treatment ratio, including drug purchasing and other means, reaches 93.4%. 60.7% of them affirmatively responded that they did not or could not get physician's treatment at least once even though they thought they had to. It is disclosed that 29.4% of them are caused by economical reason. 10. Average medical expense per case amounts won7,116 and monthly medical expense per capita won1,345. Consequently, average monthly medical expense per family amounts won6,185. 11. The medical expense of a family is rated 7.7% of total earnings of the same period.
Asian Continental Ancestry Group ; Child ; Chronic Disease ; Delivery of Health Care* ; Family Characteristics ; Female ; Humans ; Insurance ; Parents ; Physicians, Family ; Prevalence ; Surveys and Questionnaires ; Spouses

The study of traditional Chinese medicine and its complex prescription gradually adopted the methods of serum pharmacology, which has become a new researching thought and a gained more attention. In this article, the background of relevant researches, methodological discussions, analysis of the advantages and problems of serum pharmacology were reviewed. The serum pharmacology, for its unique value, will certainly has a brilliant prospect in its application to the research of traditional Chinese medicine and its complex prescription.

The paper probed into the practice of working with independent medical laboratories in building county-wide clinical laboratories,in providing logistics and medical test support services.Such laboratories are advantageous in its developed logistics network,standardized quality management,and complete variety of testing items,notably its scale of economy.They can provide direct support to enable the county centers to rapidly cover communities with standard medical tests,thus playing a major role in the integration of county-level medical institutions.

In light of the important role of health-promoting expenditure in health, the objective of this study was to investigate the socio-demographic determinants of health-promoting expenditure such as purchase of medical equipment and services, food supplements and health education services and products among Malaysian adults. Third National Health and Morbidity Survey (NHMS III) consisting of 28771 observations was used for analysis. It was the latest nationally representative cross-sectional population-based survey conducted by the Ministry of Health Malaysia from April 2006 to January 2007. A censored regression model (Tobit) was applied to examine the factors affecting health-promoting expenditure. The results showed that age, income, gender, ethnicity, education, marital status, employment status and location of residence were able to affect health-promoting expenditure. In particular, individuals who were younger, poor, males, Indian/others, less educated, unmarried, unemployed and residing in rural areas tended to spend less money on health promotion compared to others. This study reached a conclusion that socio-demographic factors were significantly associated with individual’s preferences for health promotion. Therefore, the government should devote its attention to these factors when formulating nationwide health policies.
Demography ; Disease ; Health Promotion ; Life Style ; prevention & control ; Malaysia

In light of the increases in alcohol-induced diseases and social problems, the present study sets out to examine the factors affecting alcohol consumption among adults in Penang (Malaysia) using a cross-sectional survey sample consisting of 398 respondents. The results of the logistic regression analysis show that age, gender, ethnicity, marital status and smoking are signifi cantly associated with alcohol consumption. In particular, males (OR: 3.720; 95% CI: 1.939, 7.136), Chinese (OR: 3.628; 95% CI: 1.808, 7.279) and smokers (OR: 5.083; 95% CI: 1.876, 13.774) are more likely to consume alcohol than others, whereas, old individuals (OR: 0.971; 95% CI: 0.941, 1.002), Malays (OR: 0.059; 95% CI: 0.021, 0.165) and married individuals (OR: 0.419; 95% CI: 0.211, 0.833) are less likely to consume alcohol than others. Based on the fi ndings of the present study, several intervention strategies toward reducing alcohol consumption are proposed. Specifi cally, these strategies should be targeted at young individuals, males, Chinese, unmarried individuals and smokers

Background: In the context of global increases in the prevalence of non-communicable diseases, the objective of the present study is to investigate the factors affecting individuals’ decisions to use health-promoting goods and services. Methods: The Third National Health and Morbidity Survey (NHMS III), consisting of 30992 respondents, was analysed. The Pearson chi-square test was applied to compare the distribution of categorical variables. A binary logistic regression model was used to assess the likelihood of using health-promoting goods and services. Results: Age, income, gender, ethnicity, education, marital status, location of residence, job characteristics, and being diagnosed with hypercholesterolemia were significantly associated with use of health-promoting goods and services. In contrast, young individuals, low income earners, males, Indians and others, the less-educated, single individuals, rural dwellers, the unemployed and individuals with hypercholesterolemia were less likely to use health-promoting goods and services than others. Conclusion: Socio-demographic and health factors played an important role in affecting the use of health-promoting goods and services. Based on these factors, several intervention measures with the intent of increasing the use of health-promoting goods and services were suggested, if only applicable to Malaysians.

Background: In light of the fact that chronic diseases were becoming more prevalent recently, the primary objective of the study was to examine the socio-demographic, health, and lifestyle determinants of the use of preventive medical care in Penang, Malaysia. Methods: The study used the primary survey data in Penang which had a total of 398 respondents. Respondents were chosen based on convenient sampling, and the survey was carried out in various locations in Penang. During the survey, the designed questionnaires were distributed for self-administration by the respondents between August and October, 2010. The binary logistic regression model was employed for statistical analysis. Results: Socio-demographic and health factors like income, marital status, education, history of serious family illnesses and self-perceived health status were statistically significant in affecting the likelihood of using preventive medical care. Specifically, being married (OR: 1.94; 95% CI: 1.13, 3.32), the presence of a history of serious family illnesses (OR: 2.14; 95% CI: 1.37, 3.36), having high income (OR: 8.71; 95% CI: 1.03, 73.59) and self-perceived poor health status (OR: 4.78; 95% CI: 1.09, 21.00) were positively related with using preventive medical care. However, having low educational background (OR: 0.23; 95% CI: 0.06, 0.95) were inversely related to the probability of using such medical care. Conclusion: In view of the findings, the individuals’ socio-demographic and health profiles were suggested to be given attention by the public health authorities if the goals of increasing the use of preventive medical care in the community were to be achieved.

Statins are a class of hydroxymethylglutaryl-CoA (HMG-CoA) reductase inhibitors, which are pervasively used to reduce blood cholesterol concentration in hypercholesterolemic patients and prevent cardiovascular diseases in clinic, duo to excellent drug efficiency and good safety. In recent years, increasing evidences have demonstrated that statins have potential anti-tumor effect through inhibiting cancer cells growth, invasion, metastasis, preventing angiogenesis, promoting cancer cells apoptosis and synergetically enhancing the effect of radiotherapy and chemotherapy. However, there are no domestic reports about statins' effect on endometrial carcinoma, additionally, conclusions of related foreign studies are inconsistent. This review summarized the effect of statins on endometrial carcinoma.

Adult ; Drugs, Chinese Herbal ; pharmacology ; therapeutic use ; Female ; Humans ; Infertility, Female ; drug therapy ; Ovulation ; drug effects ; Ovulation Induction ; Phytotherapy