This study defines a vulnerable group in a community that has become the main target of a national health project also, it is descriptive research to suggest an evidence-based direction to meet their deficit health-related needs.

This research examined 833 families and 1,835 family members of the financially vulnerable class that was registered in a home visiting program of a public health center. Among them, 892 persons who had health problems, and their family members were examined in detail to find out their characteristics of vulnerability and health needs by assessment during a nurses home visit. Frequency distribution, stepwise-regression and factor analysis were used to analyze the data.

The vulnerable group that was defined with social indexes set as standards, involved substantial characteristics of vulnerability. The characteristics of demand showed tendencies of being clustered in 5 factors needs of intensive nursing care, chronic nursing care problems and helplessness, maintenance of family functioning with a disability, deficient problem solving ability, and simple financial fragility.

Categorization of needs is an evidence-based estimator of workload in nurse home visiting services, and can be used as a basic resource for direction to meet the deficit needs of a vulnerable group.

As comprehensive nursing care service has gradually expanded, it has become necessary to explore the various opinions about it. The purpose of this study is to explore the large amount of text data regarding comprehensive nursing care service extracted from online news and social media by applying a semantic network analysis.

The web pages of the Korean Nurses Association (KNA) News, major daily newspapers, and Twitter were crawled by searching the keyword ‘comprehensive nursing care service’ using Python. A morphological analysis was performed using KoNLPy. Nodes on a ‘comprehensive nursing care service’ cluster were selected, and frequency, edge weight, and degree centrality were calculated and visualized with Gephi for the semantic network.

A total of 536 news pages and 464 tweets were analyzed. In the KNA News and major daily newspapers, ‘nursing workforce’ and ‘nursing service’ were highly rated in frequency, edge weight, and degree centrality. On Twitter, the most frequent nodes were ‘National Health Insurance Service’ and ‘comprehensive nursing care service hospital.’ The nodes with the highest edge weight were ‘national health insurance,’ ‘wards without caregiver presence,’ and ‘caregiving costs.’ ‘National Health Insurance Service’ was highest in degree centrality.

This study provides an example of how to use atypical big data for a nursing issue through semantic network analysis to explore diverse perspectives surrounding the nursing community through various media sources. Applying semantic network analysis to online big data to gather information regarding various nursing issues would help to explore opinions for formulating and implementing nursing policies.

This study was performed to investigate the relationship among reciprocity, emotional labor, nursing service quality and intent to leave, and to identify factors influencing nursing service quality and intent to leave.

This study was a cross-sectional survey. Participants were 300 nurses working at five general hospitals in two provincial cities in Gyeongsang Province, Korea. From May 1 to June 30, 2014, data were collected using structured questionnaires and analyzed with SPSS/PC ver 20.0 programs.

There were relationships between reciprocity and nursing service quality, and intent to leave, and between emotional labor and intent to leave. Participants' general characteristics, reciprocity and emotional labor explained 48.4% of variance in nursing service quality and participants' general characteristics and these two independent variables explained 31.9% of intent to leave.

These findings indicate that from the perception of hospital nurses, reciprocity and emotional labor are both very important factors to improve the quality of nursing service and decrease the intent to leave. So nursing managers should try to develop various personnel management programs focused on human emotions, and create a mutual respectable organizational culture and work environment.

Cost-benefit analysis is one of the most commonly used economic evaluation methods, which helps to inform the economic value of a program to decision makers. However, the selection of a correct benefit estimation method remains critical for accurate cost-benefit analysis. This paper compared benefit estimations among three different benefit estimation models.

Data from community-based chronic hypertension management programs in a city in South Korea were used. Three different benefit estimation methods were compared. The first was a standard deterministic estimation model; second, a repeated-measures deterministic estimation model; and third, a transitional probability estimation model.

The estimated net benefit of the three different methods were $1,273.01, $-3,749.42, and $-5,122.55 respectively.

The transitional probability estimation model showed the most correct and realistic benefit estimation, as it traced possible paths of changing status between time points and it accounted for both positive and negative benefits.

The purpose of this study was to estimate nursing costs and to establish appropriate nursing fees for long-term care services for community elders.

Seven nurses participated in data collection related to visiting time by nurses for 1,100 elders. Data on material costs and management costs were collected from 5 visiting nursing agencies. The nursing costs were classified into 3 groups based on the nurse's visit time under the current reimbursement system of long-term care insurance.

The average nursing cost per minute was 246 won. The material costs were 3,214 won, management costs, 10,707 won, transportation costs, 7,605 won, and capital costs, 5,635 won per visit. As a result, the average cost of nursing services per visit by classification of nursing time were 41,036 won (care time <30 min), 46,005 won (care time 30-59 min), and 57,321 won (care time over 60 min).

The results of the study indicate that the fees for nurse visits currently being charged for long-term care insurance should be increased. Also these results will contribute to baseline data for establishing appropriate nursing fees for long-term care services to maintain quality nursing and management in visiting nursing agencies.

The aim of this study was to analysize net income of a surgical nursing ward in a general hospital.

Data collection and analysis was conducted using a performance-based costing and activity-based costing method.

Direct nursing activities in the surgical ward were 68, indirect nursing activities were 10. The total cost volume of the surgical ward was calculated at ₩119,913,334.5. The cost volume of the allocated medical department was ₩91,588,200.3, and the ward consumed cost was ₩28,325,134.2. The revenue of the surgical nursing ward was ₩33,269,925.0. The expense of a surgical nursing ward was ₩28,325,134.2. Therefore, the net income of a surgical nursing ward was ₩4,944,790.8.

We suggest that to develop a more refined nursing cost calculation model, a standard nursing cost calculation system needs to be developed.

This study was designed to develop Nursing Service Quality Indicators(NSQIs) in nursing homes that would lead to an appropriate evaluation and improvement of nursing service quality.

The preliminary NSQIs were developed through literature reviews and analysis of existing quality indicators. A content validity testing was done twice by using a panel of experts who were from academia and the clinical areas. The final NSQIs were confirmed and applied in three nursing homes to test feasibility.

The preliminary NSQIs had 4 domains and 31 indicators. Two content validity testings were performed. The indicators scoring over .80 CVI for each testing were selected and modified by experts' opinions. The final NSQIs consisted of7 domains and 33 indicators. They were applied in three nursing homes and it was revealed that all the indicators were applicable.

In this study, it is shown that this new 'Nursing Service Quality Indicators in Nursing Homes' is suitable for a holistic evaluation of nursing service quality of elderly patients in nursing homes. This NSQIs will be able to provide a basis for establishing nursing care standards and improving the nursing care quality in nursing homes.