• Therapeutic Science for Rehabilitation
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.99-107
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• 2023

Objective : To investigate the effects of thorax mobility exercises on thorax mobility, breathing pattern, and respiratory capacity in subjects with restricted thorax mobility. Methods : Thirteen subjects with restricted thorax mobility participated in this study. Measurement of thorax circumference using a tape measure (difference between inhalation and exhalation), breathing pattern (distance of rib cage elevation during breathing), and respiratory capacity was performed. Paired t-test was used to compare the thorax mobility, breathing pattern, and respiratory capacity between before and after thorax mobility excercise. Statiscal significance was set at .05. Results : There were significant differences in thorax mobility and breathing pattern, but no significant difference in respiratory capacity (p < .05). Conclusion : Based on the results of this study, thorax mobility exercise using the rib mobilization technique is considered to be a method that can improve thorax mobility and normalize abnormal breathing patterns that cause rib cage elevation.

• Journal of Chest Surgery
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.213-217
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• 1995

Mediastinal ganglioneuroma is infrequently encountered in childhood. The posterior mediastinal ganglioneuroma which extended the contralateral thorax was very rare. A 4-year-old boy had a ganglioneuroma which involved bilateral thorax and encased the aorta and azygous vein and the ganglioneuroma was successfully extirpated by two-staged operations.; left thoracotomy first right thoracotomy 10days later.

• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.143-147
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• 2021

The purpose of this study is to investigate how the application of a Thorax belt affects the stability of the spine in subjects with a wide infra-sternal angle. A total of 15 subject with wide infra-sternal angle participated in the experiment. Active Double leg lowering and active one-leg raising were performed with or without a thorax belt. Two spinal stability tests (active double lowering and active one-leg raising) performed with or without thorax belt application showed significant differences between each condition. Based on the results of present study, the application of a thorax belt is considered to be an effective therapeutic tool that can stabilize the spine to subjects with abnormally increased chest cage and spinal or trunk instability.

• PNF and Movement
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.243-250
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• 2021

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to observe office workers' postural behaviors during computer work to identify the risk factors for head and thorax postural behaviors. Methods: The participants included 57 office workers who worked longer than 20 hours on a computer. Postural behaviors during computer work were measured using 3-D wearable motion sensors on the forehead and sternum. A multivariate linear regression model evaluated the association between various risk factors (neck pain, demographics, and environmental factors) and non-head and thorax postural behaviors. Results: The participants maintained their head and thorax in neutral postures (defined as 10° extension~10° flexion and 5° extension~10° flexion, respectively) for 24.7% and 39.3% of the total recorded time. Those who reported neck pain at the measurement of postural behaviors showed less time spent in thorax postures. Current neck pain, high desk height, and the distance between the keyboard and the edge of the desk (cm) were found to be related to less time spent in a neutral thorax posture. Conclusion: Office environment factors and current neck pain might affect workers' thorax postures, which might also determine the orientation of head postures during computer work.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.56 no.6
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• pp.571-584
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• 2004

Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) is one of the most advanced imaging techniques in clinical and research medicine. However, clinical application of MRI to the lung or thorax has been limited due to various drawbacks. Low signal intensity of the lung and cardiac and respiratory movements are the most serious problems with MRI in thorax. Nevertheless, MRI is superior to CT in some selected patients with thoracic diseases. The role of clinical MRI in thoracic disease has been widened with improvement of MR equipments and development of new pulse sequences. Otherwise, functional assessment of lung by MRI has been studied for the last decade. These include perfusion MRI with or without contrast enhancement and ventilation MRI with oxygen-enhancement or hyperpolarized noble gas, $^3He$ and $^{129}Xe$.

• Journal of Chest Surgery
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• v.49 no.3
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• pp.165-170
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• 2016

Background: In elderly high-risk surgical patients, sutureless aortic valve replacement (AVR) should be an alternative to standard AVR. The potential advantages of sutureless aortic prostheses include reducing cross-clamping and cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) time and facilitating minimally invasive surgery and complex cardiac interventions, while maintaining satisfactory hemodynamic outcomes and low rates of paravalvular leakage. The current study reports our single-center experience regarding the early outcomes of sutureless aortic valve implantation. Methods: Between October 2012 and June 2015, 65 patients scheduled for surgical valve replacement with symptomatic aortic valve disease and New York Heart Association function of class II or higher were included to this study. Perceval S (Sorin Biomedica Cardio Srl, Sallugia, Italy) and Edwards Intuity (Edwards Lifesciences, Irvine, CA, USA) valves were used. Results: The mean age of the patients was $71.15{\pm}8.60years$. Forty-four patients (67.7%) were female. The average preoperative left ventricular ejection fraction was $56.9{\pm}9.93$. The CPB time was $96.51{\pm}41.27minutes$ and the cross-clamping time was $60.85{\pm}27.08minutes$. The intubation time was $8.95{\pm}4.19hours$, and the intensive care unit and hospital stays were $2.89{\pm}1.42days$ and $7.86{\pm}1.42days$, respectively. The mean quantity of drainage from chest tubes was $407.69{\pm}149.28mL$. The hospital mortality rate was 3.1%. A total of five patients (7.69%) died during follow-up. The mean follow-up time was $687.24{\pm}24.76days$. The one-year survival rate was over 90%. Conclusion: In the last few years, several models of valvular sutureless bioprostheses have been developed. The present study evaluating the single-center early outcomes of sutureless aortic valve implantation presents the results of an innovative surgical technique, finding that it resulted in appropriate hemodynamic conditions with acceptable ischemic time.

• The Journal of Korean Society for Radiation Therapy
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• v.26 no.1
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• pp.83-89
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• 2014

Purpose : In case of the intensity modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) using Tomotherapy and linear accelerator (Linac), it was to compare and to evaluate the imaging dose of MVCT and CBCT that were performed daily for the correct set up of the patient. Materials and Methods : The human body model Phantom (Anderson rando Phantom, USA) was divided into the three parts as Head, Thorax, pelvis, and after GafChromic EBT3 film cut to the size of $0.5{\times}0.5cm2$.in the center of the recording area were situated on the ant, post, left, and right surface of the phantom and 2cm in depth from the ant, post, left, right, and center surface of the phantom, the surface dose and inner dose were measured repeatedly three times, respectively, using the tomotherapy (Hi Art) and the OBI of NovalisTx. The measured film calculated the output value by RIP version6.0 and then the average value of the dose was calculated by the one-way analysis of variance. Results : Using the human body model phantom, the results of MVCT and CBCT performance were that measurements of MVCT inner dose were showed $15.43cGy{\pm}6.05$ in the head, $16.62cGy{\pm}3.08$ in the thorax, $16.81cGy{\pm}5.24$ in the pelvis, and measurements of CBCT inner dose were showed $13.28{\pm}3.68$ in the head, from $13.66{\pm}4.04$ in the thorax, $15.52{\pm}3.52$ in the pelvis. The measurements of surface dose were showed in case of MVCT performance, $11.64{\pm}4.05$ in the head, $12.16{\pm}4.38$ in the thorax, $12.05{\pm}2.71$ in the pelvis, and in case of CBCT performance, $14.59{\pm}3.51$ in the head, $15.82{\pm}2.89$ in the thorax, $17.48{\pm}2.80$ in the pelvis, respectively. Conclusion : In case of Inner dose, the MVCT using MV energy showed higher than the CBCT using kV energy at 1.16 times in the head, at 1.22 times in the thorax, at 1.08 times in the pelvis, and in case of surface dose, the CBCT was higher than MVCT, at 1.25 times in the head, at 1.30 times in the thorax, at 1.45 times in the pelvis. Imaging dose was a small amount compared to the therapeutic dose but it was thought to affect partially to normal tissue because it was done in daily schedule. However, IMRT treatment was necessarily parallel with the IGRT treatment through the image-guide to minimize errors between planned and actual treatment. Thus, to minimize imaging dose that the patients receive, when planning the treatment, it should be set up a treatment plan considering imaging dose, or it must be performed by minimizing the scan range when shooting MVCT.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2010.05a
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• pp.1367-1368
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• 2010

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.40 no.4
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• pp.345-352
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• 1993

The role of magnetic resonance(MR) imaging in the evaluation of thoracic disease has been limited Nontheless, MR has inherent properties of better contrast resolution than CT allowing tissue-specific diagnosis. MR has capability of direct imaging in sagittal, coronal, and oblique planes which provide better anatomic information than axial images of CT such as lesions in the pulmonary apex, aorticopulmonary window, peridiaphragmatic region, and subcarinal region. MR is sensitive to blood flow making it an ideal imaging modality for the evaluation of cardiovascular system of the thorax without the need for intravenous contrast media. Technical developments and better control of motion artifacts have resulted in improved image quality, and clinical applications of MR imaging in thoracic diseases have been expanded. Although MR imaging is considered as a problem-solving tool in patients with equivocal CT findings, MR should be used as the primary imaging modality in the following situations: 1) Evaluation of the cardiovascular abnormalities of the thorax 2) Evaluation of the superior sulcus tumors 3) Evaluation of the chest wall invasion or mediastinal invasion by tumor 4) Evaluation of the posterior mediastinal mass, especially neurogenic tumor 5) Differentiation of fibrosis and residual or recurrent tumor, especially in lymphoma 6) Evaluation of brachial plexopathy With technical developments and fast scan capabilities, clinical indications for MR imaging in thorax will increase in the area of pulmonary parenchymal and pulmonary vascular imaging.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.17 no.6
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• pp.447-453
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• 2008

Respiration rate is one of the important vital signs. Photo-plethysmography (PPG) measurement especially on a finger has been widely used in pulse oximetry and also used in estimating respiration rate. It is well known that PPG contains respiration-induced intensity variation (RIIV) signal. However, the accuracy of finger PPG method has been controversial. We introduced a new technique of enhancing motion artifact by respiration. This was achieved simply by measuring PPG on the thorax. We examined the accuracy of these two PPG methods by comparing with two existing methods based on thoracic volume and nostril temperature changes. PPG sensing on finger tip, which is the most common site of measurement, produced 6.1 % error. On the other hand, our method of PPG sensing on the thorax achieved 0.4 % error which was a significant improvement. Finger PPG is sensitive to motion artifact and it is difficult to recover fully small respiratory signal buried in waveform dominated by absorption due to blood volume changes. Thorax PPG is poor to represent blood volumes changes since it contains substantial motion artifact due to respiration. Ironically, this inferior quality ensures higher accuracy in terms of respiration measurement. Extreme low-cost and small-sized LED/silicon detector and non-constrained reflection measurement provide a great candidate for respiration estimation in ubiquitous or personal health monitoring.