The purpose of the study was to identify the effects of 12-week low-intensity exercise program on muscle strength, flexibility, balance, and cognitive characteristics related to the performance of activity of daily living(ADL). A total of 16 patients who were admitted to the medical unit of a general hospital in ChoongChung province were recruited eight for the exercise group and eight for the comparison group. Four levels of low-intensity exercise from 'ROM on bed' to 'exercise while walking' were then applied to the exercise group according to their physical condition. During hospitalization, patients in the exercise group performed each level of the prescribed exercise with the researchers until they felt. comfortable doing it independently. The researchers also visited the patients' homes after discharge to make sure they could perform the exercise with Theraband in their living environment. The exercise group was contacted by phone once a week to assess the frequency and intensity in which they performed the exercise as well as their physical condition. The subjects in the comparison group participated in measurements for the study without performing the exercise and were contacted by phone after discharge, in a matched time frame with the exercise group, to assess physical condition. Muscle strength, flexibility, balance, cognitive characteristics, and performance of ADL for the two groups were compared at the pretest and the posttest after the low-intensity exercise program by utilizing SPSSWIN and the results are as follows : 1) At the posttest, measurments of muscle strengths showed that the strength of the dorsal flexor in the exercise group was significantly higher than in the comparison group. 2) Objective balance for the exercise group was significantly better than for the comparison group as measured by 'standing on one foot' and Tinetti gait and balance control. 3) The exercise group showed significantly higher task self-efficacy than the comparison group. 4) Perceived exertion for ADL for the exercise group was significantly lower than for the comparison group. 5) Improvement of performance of ADL without assistance was significantly for the exercise group than the comparison group. The findings suggest that a low-intensity exercise program would be useful for the elderly who show decline in their physical functioning due to hospitalization by partly improving physical strength, task self-efficacy, and performance of ADL. Directions for further research on issues of motivating people to exercise as well as of standardizing various types of exercise were discussed.

PURPOSE: This study was conducted to evaluate the effects of SaSang constitutional diet for essential hypertension on blood pressure, fat, and serum lipid on the subjects with aerobic exercise and low salt diet at the same time. METHOD: A non-equivalent control group time-series design was used. For the experimental group, aerobic exercise and SaSang constitutional diet were taught by researcher at health center. Test for hypothesis was done by repeated measured ANOVA. RESULT: There was significant decrease in systolic, diastolic, and MAP between the experimental group and control group over three different times. There was significant decrease in body weight, BMI, and body composition over three different times. But, there was no significant difference between groups and interaction by groups or over time. There was significant decrease in T/G and cholesterol over three different times. But, there was no significant difference in T/G, HDL, LDL, and total cholesterol between groups and interaction by groups or over time. CONCLUSION: Findings indicate that this study will contribute to develop nursing strategies for the regulation of the blood pressure as a means of alternative- complementary nursing intervention.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to identify the burden, health promotion behavior and health status and to describe the relationship of the burden, health promotion behavior and health status of the family caregivers of intensive care unit patients. METHOD: The subjects were 48 family caregivers of ICU patients in a University Hospital. Data were collected between June, 1 and July, 31, 2000 using structured questionnaires. Research tools used were Suh and Oh's Burden Scale, Revised Walker, Sechrist, and Pender's HPLP(1987) ; Revised Nam's Health State Scale(1965). RESULT: The mean score of burden of family caregiver was 3.01(full score was 5). The mean score of health promotion behavior of family caregiver was 2.52 (full score was 4). And the mean score of health status of family caregiver was 0.68(full score was 1.00). The score of psychological health state was a little higher than the physiological one. In correlational analysis, the burden and the health status of caregivers were reversely correlated . The correlation between the burden and the health promotion behavior, and the health behavior and health status were not significant. CONCLUSION: The more burden caregivers of ICU patients felt, the worse their health status. So nurses need to understand the family caregiver's burden and apply nursing care that can reduce burden, in order to improve the health status of family caregivers.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of a Yoga program on decreasing blood pressure in elderly patients with essential hypertension and to suggest a yoga program effective as a nursing intervention tool to reduced blood pressure with increasing life satisfaction. METHOD: The subjects of this study were 24 elderly's essential hypertension, who practiced yoga by three times a week for 8 weeks. In order to evaluate the effect of the yoga program, blood pressure, physiological parameters (Total cholesterol, HDL, LDL, triglycerides) and level of life satisfaction were measured before and after the training. Collected date were analyzed by SPSSWIN program. RESULT: 1) There were significant reduction in systolic and diastolic blood pressure. 2) There were significant reductions in total cholesterol, LDL, triglycerides but no significant increased in HDL. 3) Blood pressure changes were time specific: Both of systolic and diastolic blood pressures were significantly reduced after 2weeks. 4) There was a significant increase in life satisfaction. CONCLUSION: The results proved that a yoga program was an effective nursing intervention to reduce blood pressure and to increased life satisfaction for elderly patients with essential hypertension.

PURPOSE: In order to improve self-management of elderly hypertensives in this study, the researcher examined the effect of blood pressure regulation by an abdominal relaxed breathing training which regulates physical response to stress and lessens the activity of the sympathetic nerve.
METHOD
A quasi-experimental pre-test and post-test design was used. Thirty elderly hypertensive patient ; Sixteen in the abdominal breathing group and fourteen in the control group participated in this study. The abdominal relaxed breathing training consisted of eight sessions twice a week for four weeks. There was no intervention for the control group.
RESULT
1. There was a significant decrease in systolic and diastolic blood pressure between the experimental group and control group over three different times, and interaction by groups and over time. 2. There was no significant difference in the level of total stress response, physical stress response, behavioral-cognitive stress response between the experimental group and control group over three different times, and interaction by groups and over time.
CONCLUSION
Findings indicate that this study will contribute to develop nursing strategies for the regulation of blood pressure for the elderly, which is easy for the elderly to learn as a nonpharmacologic approach.

PURPOSE: To find the experience about clients with hypertension and to help them to care for themselves in the community.
METHOD
All data was collected from August 1999 to October 1999, through in-depth interviews, observation, and telephone interview with 7 participants who have been diagnosed with hypertension for 1 to 10 years. According to Strauss and Corbin's Methodology, the data was continuously coded into concepts and categories, and then new data was analyzed simultaneously by a constant comparative method.
RESULTS
There are 171 concepts, and then they were grouped into 34 the lower categories and 15 to the upper categories. The course of the coping of fear in hypertensive client consisted of 6 processes. The awareness of seriousness was context, and the fear was core phenomenon about the coping experience. We also found that hypertensive clients have 3 patterns, depending on the awareness degree of seriousness and the fear about hypertension.
CONCLUSION
Our nurses should recognize the importance of effective management and seriousness about hypertension, offer clients the importance of family support and the information of etiology, symptoms and signs of hypertension, and provide the correct information on hypertensive medication. We should be able to guide their fear about hypertension to positive self-management, so that they may manage their disease thoroughly and effectively.

This study was conducted to identify a effect of the comprehensive self-regulation program for hypertensives as a nursing intervention on self-care performance and the physiologic parameters in rural areas. For this purpose, a nonequivalent control group and a pre and post-test quasi- experimental design was used. Fifty-four were evaluated subjects from two Community Health Practitioner Posts in the suburbs of Taejon City. The subjects of the control and experimental groups were matched for age and sex. The self-regulation program developed by author given to the experimental group. The program consisted of group education on hypertension and self-care, self-regulation including the blood pressure self-monitoring, recording of self-care activities, and encouraging and reinforcing self-efficacy. The whole program was carried out from September to November of 1999. The data were analyzed by repeated measure ANCOVA, t-test, and ANCOVA. The results were as follows; There was significant improvement in the scores on knowledge (F=.68, P=.004), perceived self-efficacy (F=26.39, P=.000), self-care performance (F=26.11, P=.000) of the experimental group compared with those of the control group. There was no significant change on the score of locus of control, perceived benefits and perceived barrier, blood cholesterol level, body weight between two groups (P>.05). From these results, it can be concluded that the self-regulation program is an effective nursing strategy to promote self-care performance of hypertensives in rural area.

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effects of Chu-ma therapy and to suggest that the therapy is an effective nursing intervention tool to reduce blood pressure. The research design employed was the non-synchronized research method with non- equivalent control group. A total of 30 people with essential hypertension, who were from forty to sixty five years old, participated in the study. The Chu-ma therapy was administered by every day for ten or fifteen minutes for eight weeks from 19, April to 13, June in 1999. In order to evaluate the effects of Chu-ma therapy, blood pressure of the two groups were measured once a week, and physiological parameters (epinephrine, norepinephrine, total cholesterol, HDL-cholesterol, triglycerides) were measured before and after the treatment. Collected data was analyzed by SAS package. The results of this study can be summarized as follows: 1) There were significant decrease in systolic blood pressure and diastolic blood pressure in the experimental group. 2) There were no significant changes in epinephrine, norepinephrine of the two groups. 3) There were significant decrease in total cholesterol and triglycerides, and HDL- cholesterol increased significantly in the experimental group. 4) The effect of Chu-ma therapy on the measured time on the blood pressure in experimental group was as follows: Both of systolic and diastolic blood pressures were significantly decreased after 5weeks. The result proved that Chu-ma therapy is an effective nursing intervention tool for clients with essential hypertenion. However further research is still necessary to compare the effect with the different periods and number of times for Chu-ma therapy.

The study was conducted to confirm the construct of individual perception and preference for work characteristics as personal factors influencing Korean nurses' job satisfaction. The subjects of the study were 231 nurses who are currently working in intensive care units and have been for a minimum of 6 months. The study used the Staff Perception and Preference Scale(Song et al., 1997) to measure the individual's perception and preference on the technical, practice, and management components of the ideal work environment. The Korean version of the Staff Perception and Preference Scale consists of 16 items on perception and 13 on preference with each item related on a scale from 1 (not at all) to 4 (a great deal). Psychometric testing revealed that the preference and perception scale is internally consistent with Chronbach's alphas of .83 for perception scale and .80 for preference scale. The subscales of the perception and preference scale also showed acceptable reliability for the early stage of the development of the instruments with Chronbach alphas of .62-.76 and .69-.83 respectively. Criterion0related validity of the scale was tested by examining correlations with individual growth need that is conceptually close to individual preference, but not to individual perception. Individual growth need was significantly related to individual preference(r=.63, p<.05), but the correlation with the perception scale was not significant. A separate factor analysis for the each of perception and preference scales was performed with a three-factor loading solution based on a previous study. The results on the staff perception scale confirmed with varimax rotation that the items were cleanly and strongly loaded on technique, practice and management components, which together explained 50.7% of the variance. The factor analysis on the staff preference scale also yielded a three factor solution that explained 56.7% of the variance, but items on technique and management components were loaded together. This phenomena may due to the current nursing delivery system in Korea where nurses never experience either shared governance nor case management, and as a results they may not be able to consider management roles as their potential extended roles. Therefore, more efforts should be given to enhance nurses' autonomy and decision making in the technique, practice and management components of their work environment. Meanwhile, there is a need for continuously confirming and developing tools for individual perception and preferences to effectively enhance job satisfaction among Korea nurses through innovative work environments.

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effects of QiGong gymnastics exercise program in the physiopsychological parameter inessential hypertension. The design of the research was a one group pretest-posttest design. A total of 20 patients with hypertension who were from forty to sixty-five years old participated in the study. The Qi Gong gymnastics program was carried out twice a week for thirty minutes or forty minutes for six weeks from 22, Sep. to 31, Oct. in 1997. In order to evaluate the effect of the QiGong gymnastics program physiological parameter(blood pressure, pulse rate, FVC, FEV1, Epinephrine, Norepinephrine, Cortisol) and psychological parameter(self-efficacy, Life satisfaction) were measured before and after the exercise program. Collected data was analyzed by the paired t-test with SAS package. The result are as follows: 1) There were significant decrease in systolic blood pressure and diastolic pressure, but there was no significant change in pulse rate. 2) There were no significant difference in FVC and FEV1. 3) There were significant decrease in epinephrine, norepinephrine and cortisol. 4) There were significant improved in general self-efficacy and life satisfaction. 5) The effect of QiGong gymnastics program by measurement time on blood pressure and pulse rate were as follows: In a systolic blood pressure was gradually significant decreased from 1 week to 6 weeks and diastolic blood pressure was significantly decreased after 4 weeks. But there was no significant in pulse rate. This results suggest that QiGong gymnastics are an appropriate nursing intervention for clients with hypertension. For further research is necessary to reevaluate the effect with a letter experimental design and longer period than 8 weeks for the QiGong gymnastics program.

This study was done using a Quasi-experimental research design to determine the effects of social support on compliance with sick role behavior in hypertensive patients and to know if the effect of the social support on compliance lasted for at least 6 months. The subjects consisted of 81 hypertensive patients who were registered in the Cardio-Vascular OPD at Chonnam National University Hospital. They were divided by random sampling into 42 people for the experimental group and 39 for the control group. Data were gathered from June 3, 1996 to June 10, 1997 through individual interviews using a structured questionnaire. The results of the study were summarized as follows : 1. Compliance with sick role behaviors in hypertensive clients was significantly increased in the experimental group who received social support from the nurse as compared to the control group who did not receive social support(t=15.99, p<.001). 2. The effect of social support on compliance with sick role behaviors in hypertensive clients lasted for 6 months(t=7.99, p<.001). 3. Four of six people stopped smoking in experimental group after the intervention of social support, but none of the five in control group were able to stop smoking. Fisher's Exact test showed a significant difference between the experimental and control group(x2=4.385, p<.05). Mantel Haenszel test showed that the effect of social support on stopping smoking in the experimental group lasted for six months because there were no significant differences between one month after the social support and six months after, in the number of subjects who stopped smoking(x2=1.154, p>.05). Finally, social support was effective on compliance with sick role behaviors and stopping smoking in the hypertensive clients, and the effect of social support on compliance lasted for 6 months.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to describe the essence of the experiences of patients in an ICU, and to understand them from the patients' point of view. METHODS: Participants in this study were six patients in P hospital. Data collection consisted of in-depth interviews and an observation method done from January to April in 2005. The method was analysis using the phenomenological method proposed by Colaizzi(1978). RESULTS: The themes were classified into eight theme clusters. The eight theme clusters were finally grouped into four categories, 'shock', 'pain', 'gratefulness' and 'pleasure of revival'. CONCLUSION: The ICU patients had negative experiences in physical.mental critical situations, but also positive experiences in consolation and nurses and families' encouragement. Therefore, ICU nurses must support patients and their families to minimize the negative experiences and maximize the positive experiences.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to identify the entity of critical care nursing practices through analyzing nursing statements described by electronic nursing records in a MICU. METHODS: 176,459 nursing statements of 188 patients during a 6 month-stay were analyzed statement by statement according to the nursing process(nursing phenomena, nursing diagnosis, & nursing activity) and 21 nursing components of Saba's Clinical Care Classification. RESULTS: Among 176,459 single statements, the statements of nursing activity ranked first in number. The contents of the statements were analyzed and categorized by main themes. Among 489 categorized themes, the number of themes of nursing phenomena statements was the highest. When analyzed by Saba's clinical Care Classification, the nursing statements mainly included a physiological component. Among 21 components, the respiratory component ranked in the first position in nursing phenomena, nursing diagnosis and nursing activity. The extra statements not included in the 21 components were 9,294(15.1%) in nursing phenomena and 21,949(22.7%) in nursing activity. Most are statements related to tests and the doctor. CONCLUSION: The entity of MICU nursing practice expressed by electronic nursing records was mainly focused on physiological components and more precisely on respiratory components.