Investigation of College Students' Intention to Accept Online Education Services: An Application of the UTAUT Model in Korea

This study acknowledges the necessity to make changes in the domestic education service market given the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic outbreak in the fourth industrial revolution era. Considering the change from traditional classroom education service to online education service, we measure the online education service quality and investigate its effects on its acceptance intention among college students. We employ the SERVQUAL measurement model, a universal method with the longest history. In measuring acceptance intention, we use the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT), an accurate measurement method for the effect on acceptance intention of introducing new technology. So, this study mainly focuses on SERVQUAL and UTAUT as these tools relate to online education. The research results show that all five sub-factors of the online education service quality have positive correlations with acceptance intention. The higher the empathy with the online education service quality and the higher the performance expectancy and social influence in the UTAUT model, the higher the college students' intention to accept the online education service. Given that the significance of online education service will likely further increase in the future, this study can serve as a reference for preparing a practical framework.

Types of COVID-19 clusters and their relationship with social distancing in Seoul Metropolitan area in South Korea

BACKGROUND: Complete contact tracing of COVID-19 patients in Korea allows a unique opportunity to investigate cluster characteristics. This study aimed to investigate all the reported COVID-19 clusters in Seoul Metropolitan area from January 23 to September 24, 2020. METHODS: Publicly available COVID-19 data was collected from the Seoul Metropolitan city and Gyeonggi Province. Community clusters with >= 5 cases were characterized by size and duration and then categorized using K-means clustering, and the correlation between the types of clusters and the level of social distancing was investigated. RESULTS: A total of 134 clusters including 4,033 cases were identified. The clusters were categorized into small (Type I, II), medium (type III), and large (type IV) clusters. With the same number of daily confirmed cases, cases were composed of different types of clusters by different periods of time. Raising social distancing was related with shifting types of clusters from large to small sized clusters. CONCLUSIONS: Classification of clusters may provide opportunities to better portray the pattern of COVID-19 outbreaks and implement more effective strategies. Social distancing administered by the government may be effective in suppressing large clusters but may not be effective in controlling small and sporadic clusters.

Abdominal imaging findings in critically ill children with mis-c

AIMS & OBJECTIVES: We sought to describe abdominal imaging findings on ultrasound and computed tomography on children presenting with abdominal symptoms and multisystem inflammatory syndrome (MIS-C) related to coronavirus disease (COVID-19). METHODS: We report findings on abdominal imaging in 7 critically ill children admitted with MIS-C to a tertiary, urban intensive care unit. All children had clinical and laboratory criteria of MIS-C including positive antibody testing to COVID-19. RESULTS: Of 23 children diagnosed with MIS-C, 7 children (30%) had abdominal imaging, including ultrasound (all 7) and CT (3/7). Indications for abdominal imaging included concern for acute abdomen, gall bladder inflammation and intestinal obstruction. Hepatomegaly was the most common finding, while nephromegaly, gall bladder wall edema, ascites, intestinal inflammation and mesenteric lymphadenopathy were also seen on ultrasound. Two children had incidental finding of bilateral lower lobe consolidations on CT abdomen. One child had a thickened, enlarged appendix with diffuse inflammation of intestinal wall of descending colon and ileum on CT. Another patient with severe MIS-C had fluidfilled small bowel loops, terminal ileal inflammation, diffuse lymphadenopathy and moderate ascites on abdominal CT. This patient also had large vessel vasculitis involving the junction of the aortic arch and brachiocephalic trunk. CONCLUSIONS: Common with abdominal imaging findings in Kawasaki disease, our patients had reactive lymphadenopathy, abdominal free fluid, bowel wall thickening and vasculitis. Gall bladder hydrops, intestinal pseudo-obstruction or dilated bowel loops, commonly found in Kawasaki disease with prominent abdominal symptoms were not seen in our patients.