Is arthritis an associated risk factor for trigger finger occurrence after carpal tunnel release? A nationwide, population-based study in Korea.

PURPOSE: We hypothesized that increased friction between the flexor tendon and surrounding structures due to hand arthritis is an important risk factor for trigger finger (TF) after carpal tunnel release (CTR). Therefore, we compared TF development according to the presence or absence of arthritis in carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) patients treated with CTR. METHODS: This retrospective study was based on data collected from the National Health Insurance Service-National Sample Cohort (NHIS-NSC) in the Republic of Korea between January 1, 2002, and December 31, 2015. Patients diagnosed with TF between one month and one year after the CTR date or with a history of surgery were included in the study. During subsequent follow-up, the patients were divided into subgroups of those (1) with TF and (2) without TF. Sex, age, arthritis, and TF-related comorbidities were compared between the subgroups. RESULTS: The subgroup with TF had a higher proportion of women (9.43% vs 90.57%), the highest age range between 50 and 59 years, more cases of arthritis (32.55% vs 16.79%), and a higher proportion of patients with hypothyroidism (10.85% vs 4.60%) than the group without TF. The association between arthritis and TF after CTR was examined using a multivariate logistic regression model, showing arthritis to be a significant risk factor for TF after CTR (odds ratio, 1.35; P = 0.049). CONCLUSIONS: We identified arthritis as an important risk factor for the development of TF after CTR.

ESTIMATION OF THE CUMULATIVE EXPOSURE FREQUENCY AND CUMULATIVE EFFECTIVE DOSE OF DIAGNOSTIC MEDICAL RADIATION IN THE KOREAN POPULATION FROM 2002 TO 2010.

Along with increase in the frequency and exposure dose from the diagnostic medical radiation procedures, the public's interest in radiation exposure has also been growing. In this study, in order to estimate the Cumulative Exposure Frequency and the cumulative effective dose of diagnostic medical radiation in the Korean population, we included 680 diagnostic medical radiation procedure codes of the Health Insurance Review & Assessment Service's health insurance medical expenses data and adopted the effective dose data from the 2008 report of the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation. We combined the data of one million individuals in the national sample cohort database (2002-10) of the National Health Insurance Service. The results revealed that 93.2% (917 972) of the subjects were exposed to diagnostic medical radiation at least once in the past nine years, and the Cumulative Exposure Frequency was 17 286.4 per 1000 individuals with a cumulative effective dose of 5.7 (±17.8) mSv per person. Additionally, 93.1% (854 480) of the subjects had a cumulative effective dose less than 20 mSv, and 0.7% (6139) had a dose that exceeded 100 mSv (extreme), showing that the dosage level was mostly low. However, the number of individuals whose exposure exceeded 100 mSv/y increased 28-fold, from 18 in 2002 to 500 in 2010. In addition, the size of increase also grew each year, suggesting that cancer occurrence due to diagnostic medical radiation may have also increased. In order determine the causal relationship between cancer occurrence and diagnostic medical radiation and setup a guideline for exposure, it is necessary to monitor individual cumulative exposure doses nation-wide and follow up on heavily exposed individuals for an extended period of time.

Depression among Korean Adults with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus: Ansan-Community-Based Epidemiological Study.

OBJECTIVES: There are an increasing number of studies being carried out on depression in patients with diabetes. Individuals with diabetes have been reported as having a higher prevalence of depression compared to those without diabetes. However, only a few studies involving Korean patients have been conducted. The aims of this study were to examine the prevalence of depression and to find various risk factors according to the degree of depression among Korean patients with Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). METHODS: An Ansan-community-based epidemiological study was conducted from 2005 to 2012. The total number of participants in this study was 3,540, from which patients with diabetes (n = 753) have been selected. The presence of depression was evaluated using the Beck Depression Inventory total score. RESULTS: The prevalence of depression was 28.8%. The mean age of participants was 55.5 ± 8.2 years. We divided the participants into three groups (without-depression, moderate-depression, and severe-depression groups) to examine the depression prevalence among Korean T2DM patients. The unemployed participants had 2.40 [95% confidence interval (CI) 1.21-4.76], the low-income participants had 2.57 (95% CI 1.52-4.35), the participants using an oral diabetes medicine or insulin had 2.03 (95% CI 1.25-3.32), the participants who are currently smoking had 2.03 (95% CI 1.10-3.73), and those without regular exercise had 1.91 (95% CI 1.17-3.14) times higher odds of depression in the severe-depression group, compared with the without-depression group. CONCLUSION: There was a significant association between depression prevalence and diabetes, and we found various risk factors according to the degree of depression in Korean patients with T2DM.