We tried to grasp the actual conditions of ward nursing works perceived as much complicated ones among medical works using our proposed field-work technique which is a compactified qualitative research approach. In order to improve the efficiency of the investigation on the specialized works of ward nursing, the concerned professional knowledge was introduced by adding a nurse in the investigators. Comparing the task categorization constructed from the viewpoint of the group with a nurse to that of the engineer group without the experience of medical engagement, we could evaluate the difference in the work process of assigning the task-labels for the collected data. As a result, there found clear distinction both on the number and the content of extracted tasks between the two groups against all works for staff, coordinator, and head nurse. Introducing the concerned professional knowledge into the sequence of the field-work made it possible to save time and labor efficiently and to guarantee the quality of the result. From these findings, the proposed field-work technique by the compactified qualitative research approach is conceived as an effective method corresponding with “human centered design process” by ISO for the sake of improving the usability of large, complex and diverse systems.

View full abstract

The purpose of this study is to examine tightening pressure of the supporter and effect of the elastic property on muscle fatigue through electromyogram measurement. Wearing a magic tape style taping supporter, several healthy students carried out the flexion experiment of the elbow. At this time, the electromyogram of biceps brachii was measured, and MFCV(Muscle Fiber Conduction Velocity) by which, the muscle fatigue index was calculated. As a result, it became clear that the tightening pressure of the supporter which relieves fatigue was 21-28gf/cm². The elastic property of the supporter which relieved muscle fatigue was almost 0.8kgf/cm as a tension stretch. Local clothes pressure seems to affect that the supporter with the moderate elastic property is fixed in the appropriate tightening pressure in muscle contraction and muscle blood flow. This was assumed to be the reason why muscle fatigue is reduced.

View full abstract

The purpose of this study was to estimate the usage and comfort levels of wearing sectional pressure socks, and sectional pressure pantyhose through psycho-physiological responses. Experiment samples are socks of sectional pressure, normal socks, pantyhose of sectional pressure and normal pantyhose. The subjects were 20 female university students. Each sample was measured over the same period of time, one day, and checked using electrocardiogram measurement to determine psychological comfort and a questionnaire to determine physiological comfort. From results of electrocardiogram measurement, normal socks decreased psychological comfort more than socks of sectional pressure over time. Moreover, the difference in the psychological comfort between in pantyhose, normal pantyhose or pantyhose of sectional pressure could not be discerned by the questionnaire. From the results of the questionnaire, both socks and normal socks increased knots and discomfort as time passed, but socks of sectional pressure brought down knots and remained at a comfortable level. In pantyhose, pantyhose of sectional pressure felt more comfortable than normal pantyhose for all regions of the leg. However, as comparing thigh to ankle and calf, pantyhose of sectional pressure of comfortable sensation value exhibited discomfort, and physiological comfort showed no significant difference between pantyhose of sectional pressure and normal pantyhose after 6 hours. Therefore, we assumed that comfortable sensation for pressure of clothes was impaired, comparing thigh to ankle and calf. Consequently, we conclude that psycho-physiological comfort for pantyhose of sectional pressure was influenced by pressure of clothes on the thigh.

View full abstract

In this paper we propose a new model of an upper body of human for visual animation of Sign language, and a description method of human motion based on the model. The gestures of Sign language are represented by shapes and their changes of hands and fingers, and motion of arms. The shaping of hands is described as a code of alphabets and numbers, where alphabets denote shaping and each finger is numbered. While a number of joint angles in a time sequence are adopted in former studies, a few 3D position parameters proposed in this paper play roles as key frames in an animation, and can generate sufficiently smooth trajectories by interpolating with a spline function between them including inverse kinematics.

View full abstract

With the aging of Japanese population, various welfare equipment such as rehabilitation apparatus have been developed widely to prevent deterioration of the disease and to recover the health. It is desired to develop the suitable equipment for each human having different character and condition, since many of them are mass-produced and general-purpose tools. Then the new rehabilitation machines, which control the power in accordance with the user condition by introducing a biological monitor and feedback system of the signal, is proposed as safety and pleasant training tool. Here the basic research was carried out for such idea by using rehabilitation training machine “leg press” with the aim of strengthening antigravity muscles of the leg by the training. Biological signal and information during the machine training were measured for younger generation as well as elder person, and the relation between muscle force suffered from the external load and comfortableness as an internal reaction of the body was examined. Here the content of α wave from the pattern of electrical brain waves in electroencephalography (EEG), and skin temperature of the face were measured for the evaluation of comfortableness, while electromyography (EMG) is used to measure the muscle strength.

View full abstract

In order to clarify what is important to elderly users in product design, subjects' eye movements were recorded while looking a brochure of a blood pressure monitor. In addition, subjects evaluated importance of features of this blood pressure monitor. The results showed that they required easy and accurate monitoring of blood pressure as a fundamental function and data recall as an additional feature. Subjects' eye movements and behavior were then observed while trying to use the device. Most subjects were confused by the gap between their expectation based on the brochure information and the real device. As a result, subjects required very long time to measure their blood pressure and looked mainly for ease of use and accuracy, but not much additional features. It is concluded that a blood pressure monitor should be designed so that use of their basic functions is intuitive to elderly users.

View full abstract

Recently, public interest in health has grown, and increasing numbers of people are relying on a regular medical checkup for the early detection of disease. At the same time, the rapid development of information technology gives us much medical information, and the demands for an effective medical support system will continue to grow. The aim of this study is to develop a Hospital Search Support System (HSSS) as a part of integrated medical support system which includes electronic medical chart sharing system, specialist introduction system, medicine information system and so on. It employs Hierarchical Keyword Graph (HK Graph) for the Disease Search Support System (DSSS). DSSS can list diseases according to the strength of the relation to the symptoms inputted by a user. First, this paper shows the extraction method of symptom words for DSSS. And then this paper also shows the method to present the candidates of diseases with their rank based on the symptoms on HK Graph and the symptom severity inputted by user. This paper investigates the effectiveness of the proposed method based on the accuracy and coverage rate of symptoms and the transition of ranking of diseases with the change of symptom severity.

View full abstract

The electronic medical records (EMR) has been expected to have many effects on the healthcare practices. Since many evaluations of the EMR were subjective evaluations by the questionnaire survey of the user satisfaction rating, in this research an objective evaluation of the EMR was tried. The contributions of the EMR to sharing patient information among healthcare professions was investigated, since it seemed to be most easily achieved. According to the success model of the information system of DeLone and McLean, the user satisfaction rating, the use, and the introduction effect relate each other, and the information system functions well. Then it was tried to evaluate the use and the introduction effect objectively by the access log analysis in this research. The EMR at Kochi University Hospital was investigated, and considering the characteristics of that system the contribution of the electronic nursing records (ENR) to sharing patient information among healthcare professionals was examined. As a result, it was found that many healthcare professions who need patient information on the ENR frequently used the ENR and that the reduction of a spatial restriction on accessing nursing records and the shortening working hours to collect patient information were achieved. From the access log analyses the problems of the system for users and healthcare professions using the ENR could be identified. However, the reason why they used or did not use the ENR could not be understood and the direct question to them was necessary. It was reconfirmed that the overall evaluation that combined the satisfaction rating, the use and the introduction effect was essential for the success of the information system.

View full abstract

Disputes in medical fields occur from malpractices in diagnoses, examinations and treatments. Not only patients but also doctors and nurses who are involved in the conflicts suffer from the trouble both physically and mentally. The purpose of this paper is to inquire the nature of uncertainty in medical actions and the way of understanding the characteristics of communicative actions for avoiding disputes in medicine. The first step is to inquire the features of medical action through analyzing a judicial precedent of medical malpractice in the fields of obstetrics and gynecology. It becomes clear, first, that a single medical action can be interpreted as performed by plural agents, second, that actions including communicative ones constitute a series of actions, and, third, that it is necessary to consider in advance both the situations before an action of treatment and the measures for meeting crises that might occur afterwards. The conclusion is that, for avoiding medical disputes, it is necessary to perform appropriate comprehensive communicative actions to lessen uncertainty and to take measures to cope with emergency.

View full abstract

This paper presents an approach toward establishing tutoring system of caring actions for elder people regarding body mechanics. A human body is modeled by HAnim which is an extension of VRML description, and some actions are obtained through experiments with motion capturing, data conversion and mapping them into hierarchical joint angle motion. The joint angles are evaluated in terms of reducing strain where 3rd derivatives of joint angles are computed. In order to show the performance of our system, the efficiency of tutoring was compared among some teaching materials. The result of statistical examination showed our system had a significance against five other methods out of six including textbook and video in terms of imaginability and reproduction of 3D motion. It turned out to be desirable to utilize aural information and animation of people receiving care for better understanding of caring motion.

View full abstract

It is difficult to talk with others for the person who has a severe physical and utterance disability. Especially in outside, the difficulties increase on and it becomes a hard barrier for social participation. Although several communication aids instruments are already in market, there are almost no aid instrument for whole-body palsy patients. In this study, we developed a small portable communication aid instrument based on PDA, for the cerebral palsy patient, which can be controlled with only one switch. The aid instrument has a phrase book that has phrase collections for user's every day needs, and it has note function that user can write character by character. We evaluated the usability of the instrument, we found that the instrument that has two input method (phrase book and note function) decreased input time and can express any messages. In addition, from trial usage of a target user, we also found that it facilitates rapid conversation in everyday typical cases and it also facilitates flexible communication.

View full abstract

This study was performed to capture the overall status of and problems in palliative care from text used in medical charts. Text in medical charts of twelve patients prescribed occupational therapy or physical therapy were analyzed by the text mining method. Text information was visualized by extracting text characteristics and searching for correlations among terms. The most frequently used words were “today” and “possible”. This is because changes in the condition of patients are generally rapid. The next-most-frequent words referred to patient statements such as ‘said’, as well as “appeal”. This is because therapists regard patient statements as important clues in the assessment of the patient. In addition to appeals of hope, patients often make spiritual appeals to therapists in rehabilitation situations. In our facilities, occupational therapy and physical therapy are performed mainly in accordance with a balancing of patient hopes and statements and the requirements of effective physical and occupational therapy. Rehabilitation work will be made more effective if text in large, daily-updated medical charts can be utilized without the use of specific assessment methods.

View full abstract

Music therapists are employed in many different settings including general and psychiatric hospitals, community mental health agencies, rehabilitation centers, day care facilities, nursing homes, schools and private practice. Music therapists provide services for adults & children with psychiatric disorders, mental retardation and developmental disabilities, speech and hearing impairments, physical disabilities, and neurological impairments, among others. But, the evaluation of the effect of music therapy has not been established. In this study we examined the measurement of a patient's body sway through the use of a video system, in order to evaluate the value of the effect of music therapy. The patient's appearance is recorded with a video camera. Next, consecutive video pictures are resolved into still and individual frame images. The body sway is extracted by using the pattern matching method from these frame images. This paper proposes that the simple measurement of the body sway is a useful element in the evaluation of music therapy.

View full abstract

The effects of package color on taste impression by appearance of plastic bottled green tea were studied. In Experiment 1, participants rated the taste impressions (sweetness, astringency, mellowness, refreshment, umami, strength, flavor, quaffableness, liking) by appearance of plastic bottled green tea with nine color packages (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, brown, black, and white). It was showed that the ratings varied with color for all these taste impressions. In Experiment 2, AHP (Analytic Hierarchy Process) procedure was used to investigate how participants evaluated their preference for colors. Three kinds of taste impressions (sweetness, strength, and quaffableness) were designed as evaluation items in AHP. The results revealed that green color made a favorable impression on all evaluation items. Cluster analysis was then applied to assess potential individual difference of the preference for taste impressions. It was shown that evaluation pattern could be classified mainly into three types (high scores on sweetness, strength, or quaffableness, respectively), and that there may be differences of the preference for colors among different types of the preference for taste impressions.

View full abstract

In the present study, we examined which combination and range of colors in the landscape of residential areas can be preferred and highly evaluated by the greater Busan city (South Korea) residents. In the experiment, we presented a picture of a simulated landscape and changed the colors of the buildings systematically. The subjects evaluated the impression of the landscape using Semantic Differential method. We analyzed their evaluation by factor analysis, and the results suggested that the subjects' evaluation can be explained by three factors: harmony, quietness and warmth. Then in order to grasp the relation between evaluation items and the color scheme, we made the distribution chart of factor score and then analyzed it by using quantification theory type I. In the result, for factor score 1 (harmony), the effect of similarity is high. Warm colors and cold colors in the high hue which were decided to be identity or similarity and in case of low chroma which were decided to be identity or similarity have a high evaluation result. For factor score 2 (quietness), the effect of identity is high. The evaluation of warm colors in most of color scheme is high, natural color and cold color in the middle and low hue which were decided to be identity or similarity and in case of low chroma which were decided to be identity or similarity have a high evaluation result. For factor score 3 (warmth), the effect of identity is high. Warm colors which were decided to be identity or similarity have a high evaluation result. However, for cold colors, the evaluation result is low. Additionally, the result of investigation on the range of appropriate colors in Busan city showed that hue has variability, but 5YR-10YR of warm colors, 5G -5BG natural colors, 5B-5B cold colors have a high evaluation result. Value 7 and chroma which is lower than 4 have a high evaluation result.

View full abstract

Recently, the evaluation of the business enterprise is performed briskly because a lot of new companies have established. But, the only quantitative evaluation, such as the method of using balance sheet and the statement data of profits and losses, etc., is generally used. In this research, a qualitative new evaluation method was proposed in addition to the quantitative evaluation method such as Balance Sheets. Especially, the business executives and their environment are paid attention for the evaluation, and the possibility of this new qualitative evaluation is examined by investigating and analyzing these business executives' related materials. This paper reports the investigation and the analytical results based on the viewpoint of Kansei, concerning the business management, especially from the viewpoint of business executives. Finally, this paper shows that our proposal is a more useful method for evaluation of corporate and the business executives compared with a conventional quantitative one through these verifications.

View full abstract

Many of the things turned out to be clear through a comparative study on tactile map for blind people. Recognition on triangle, ellipse, and square as a basic characteristic of pattern was examined in the viewpoint on the first study. In relation to the results of the quantification 1 in an evaluation on a pair of samples through changes in a dimension, ratio, and degree as a variable, the fact that on the one hand a dimension contributes to triangle and ellipse, and on the other hand a degree relates to square were also as certained. Further, we studied on the effects of correlations to distinctions by assigning parameters of “interaction distance”, “tilt of interaction position” and “angle of interaction rotation” in the complex graphic in connecting to two basic patterns of the same sort. As a result, we are convinced that “tilt of interaction position” in all three patterns in outer layouts, “interaction distance” in “ellipse” and “angle of interaction rotation” in “angle” and “square” in inner layouts were contributed to their recognition. We are assured the results of these studies will come in pretty handy in providing information for making tactual maps in the future.

View full abstract

This study is aimed at improving the user-friendliness of home appliances that support the elderly and other users in their daily lives, by focusing on the functional descriptions appearing on the operation panels of products, as these are considered to have a significant impact on this objective. We also conducted a survey and analysis to assess the intelligibility of these descriptions. First, we attempted to construct a structural classification to understand the historical changes in descriptive interfaces, giving consideration to a mental model of elderly users. For this, we created an improved method of classifying user interfaces according to whether they are procedure-oriented or aim-oriented, focusing on functional descriptions. When we classified the functional descriptions of current home appliances using this method, we found that an increasing proportion of appliances feature aim-oriented interfaces characterized by qualitative expressions that tend to be vague, making use difficult for elderly people. We thus conducted a survey of interface intelligibility among elderly test subjects, focusing on aim-oriented functional descriptions of washing machines. At the same time, we attempted to classify descriptions according to the expressive forms of figures of speech and semantic modification relations, focusing on the rhetorical aspects of functional descriptions. In addition, we attempted comprehensive classifications according to criteria such as commonality of terms, presence/absence of foreign words. We then explored the relevance to the results of our intelligibility survey of elderly and young subjects. Our results suggested that some figures of speech and commonality of descriptions may have an impact on the ease-of-understanding of appliance interfaces.

View full abstract

Packages of Japanese canned coffee beverages contain design elements such as brand names and logos designed to catch consumers' attention. In order to investigate how each element catches consumers' attention, we recorded eye-movements while the subjects viewed the cans. The results were as follows: (1) The subjects view larger elements for a longer duration; (2) The subjects view graphics for a longer duration than characters, when they were of similar size; (3) The eyes move from graphics to letters; (4) and that showed obvious differences with type of layouts. Therefore, we considered that the attention to Packages were very closely related the size, the method of expression of design elements and those layouts.

View full abstract