Kim Hae Won, Jeon Woo Taek
Department of Medical Education, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea; Institute of Behavioral Science in Medicine, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea.
Department of Medical Education, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea; Department of Psychiatry, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea.
Asian J Psychiatr. 2020 Oct;53:102228. doi: 10.1016/j.ajp.2020.102228. Epub 2020 Jun 15.
Despite the continuing interests in political, economic, and public health issues of North Korea, little is known about mental health problems in North Korea. To gain a glimpse into this area of interest, we aimed to explore the characteristics of mental health research in North Korea and to identify the emphasis therein. In this context, four North Korean medical journals were selected from the Information Center on North Korea, with publication dates 2006-2017 (inclusive). For this bibliographic study's scope, we targeted studies on psychiatric problems in humans. We first selected articles based on their titles, and then finalized the study sample after reviewing the full text of primary sample articles. For main outcome measures, we used the absolute number and proportion of mental health research articles relative to total publications and the distribution of papers by research themes as defined by ICD-10 categories. Collectively, four journals published 162 mental health research articles from 2006 to 2017. The yearly volume and proportion varied between two and twenty-four and between 0.3 % and 2.7 %, respectively. The most frequently addressed ICD-10 category was F40-48, namely 'Neurotic, stress-related and somatoform disorders,' and the most frequently investigated condition was somatoform disorders. In conclusion, there has been a slow but steady increase in the research volume of psychiatry and mental health problems since 2011. The finding that the highest amount of research was conducted on somatoform disorders may suggest that mental disorder symptoms may be represented differently under the influence of socialism in North Korea.
尽管人们对朝鲜的政治、经济和公共卫生问题一直保持着关注，但对朝鲜的心理健康问题却知之甚少。为了初步了解这一感兴趣的领域，我们旨在探讨朝鲜心理健康研究的特点，并确定其中的重点。在此背景下，从朝鲜信息中心选取了4种朝鲜医学期刊，出版日期为2006年至2017年（含）。就本文献研究的范围而言，我们的目标是关于人类精神疾病问题的研究。我们首先根据文章标题进行筛选，然后在审阅主要样本文章的全文后确定研究样本。对于主要结局指标，我们使用心理健康研究文章的绝对数量和相对于总出版物的比例，以及按国际疾病分类第10版（ICD - 10）类别定义的研究主题的论文分布情况。总体而言，4种期刊在2006年至2017年期间共发表了162篇心理健康研究文章。年发表量和比例分别在2篇至24篇之间以及0.3%至2.7%之间变化。最常涉及的ICD - 10类别是F40 - 48，即“神经症、应激相关障碍和躯体形式障碍”，最常研究的疾病是躯体形式障碍。总之，自2011年以来，精神病学和心理健康问题的研究量虽增长缓慢但稳步上升。对躯体形式障碍开展的研究最多这一发现可能表明，在朝鲜社会主义的影响下，精神障碍症状可能呈现出不同的表现形式。
