Prevalence of Parainfluenza Viruses in Seoul, 2021 - 2022.

BACKGROUND: Parainfluenza virus (PIV) is a significant etiological agent of acute lower respiratory tract infections (ALRIs) in infants and young children. The present study has been conducted to investigate the prevalence of recently identified respiratory viruses. METHODS: In total, 543 oropharyngeal or nasopharyngeal swab samples collected from hospitalized patients with acute respiratory symptoms (ARS) between January and December 2021 (5,653 females and 4,950 males) were tested for respiratory viruses using RT-PCR. RESULTS: At least one respiratory virus was detected by RT-PCR in 119 out of 175 samples (68%). The most frequently detected virus was human rhinovirus (HRV) (34, 6.5%), followed by human parainfluenza viruses (HPIVs) (19, 3.6%), human bocavirus (HBoV) (8, 1.5%), human adenovirus (HAdV) (7, 1.3%), and human respiratory syncytial virus (HRSV) (4, 0.8%). HPIV-3 accounted for 3.6% (19/175) of all viral pathogens and was the second most frequently detected viral pathogen in our study. HPIV-3 infections peaked in the fall (November) of 2021. Phylogenetic analysis of the coding region of the viral protein HA revealed that all 35 (100%) of 35 HPIV-infected patients were infected with HPIV-3. CONCLUSIONS: HPIV was an important causative pathogen associated with ALRI in children hospitalized in Korea in the late fall of 2021, as the social distancing rules for COVID-19 were relaxed. These findings highlight the im-portance of HPIV as a cause of ALRI.

Relationship between Self-Esteem and Technological Readiness: Mediation Effect of Readiness for Change and Moderated Mediation Effect of Gender in South Korean Teachers.

This study aimed to investigate the moderated mediation effect of gender and the mediation effect of readiness for change (RC) on self-esteem and technology readiness (TR) among South Korean teachers. Participants were 302 teachers who are living and working in South Korea. The collected data were analyzed using frequency and correlation analyses, and the moderated mediation effect. First, we considered the differences in TR and RC according to gender, and they were reported to be higher in men than in women. The number of teachers who had worked for more than 11 years was significantly higher than that of other teaching career groups. Second, correlation analysis showed a positive correlation between self-esteem, TR, and RC by gender. Third, teachers' RC mediates the relationship between self-esteem and TR. Fourth, the teachers' gender moderated the relationship between self-esteem and RC. Additionally, teachers' gender moderated the mediating effect of RC on self-esteem and TR. Finally, based on the study results, we suggest the development of a program for improving self-esteem to enhance TR and RC among teachers of both genders. Additionally, future research should consider universal teacher sampling to facilitate the comparison of teachers' characteristics and to identify variances in the data.