Reported stories on clinical medicine, health policy, and the healthcare industry in South Korea.
Varicose Veins
A randomised trial of class I stockings found the symptom score falling from 8.90 to 6.37 while the untreated group stayed put. What it did not test is whether stockings change anything a patient would still care about in five years.
Catherine Cho6 min read
Urinary Tract Infection
A hazard ratio of 0.874, and a confidence interval running from 0.585 to 1.309. That interval is the reason this is reassurance rather than proof.
Chloe Moon6 min read
Overactive Bladder
147 women, three arms, six weeks of treatment, and a negative result reported as a negative result. One secondary outcome moved, and the authors say plainly that it was not corrected for multiple testing.
Olivia Kim6 min read
Prostate
0.83 percent against 0.88 percent, and an adjusted odds ratio of 0.997. The finding does not retire the warning — it is what a warning looks like once surgeons have acted on it.
David Seo5 min read
Overactive Bladder
95 institutions, three months of treatment, and a set of thresholds rather than an average. 2.3 percent rose by 20 mmHg or more — which is the figure a hypertensive patient should be given.
Andrew Cho6 min read
Haemorrhoids
381,031 Koreans, a median 15.5 years of follow-up, and a hazard ratio of 1.243. The group who had their haemorrhoids treated came in at 0.925 — and that interval, unlike the heart failure one, does exclude 1.
James Choi6 min read
Prostate Cancer
Capital and urban residence meant more surgery for localised disease and more intensified systemic therapy for metastatic disease. Non-capital and rural residence meant hormone therapy alone — and the association survived adjustment for age, PSA, grade and stage.
James Choi6 min read
Varicose Veins
Six randomised trials, 432 patients. The combined approach reduced the chance of needing another procedure to a third, with no more complications — and the case for waiting survives anyway, for a reason the trials cannot measure.
Catherine Cho6 min read
Prostate
Korean national data put the odds of a fall at 1.80 among men starting an alpha-blocker. The timing is the finding: 455 of 968 falls occurred on day one, which makes this a risk that can be planned around.
Catherine Cho6 min read
Urinary Tract Infection
Conventional culture found an organism in 16.4 percent of recurrent cases. Sequencing found one in 82.4 percent — and the organisms it found were not the same ones.
Andrew Cho6 min read
Obesity
3,804 operated patients against 15,240 matched controls. Urate-lowering therapy fell to control levels by month 13; acute medication use fell too, and stayed above controls throughout.
Chloe Moon6 min read
Overactive Bladder
A cumulative cognitive burden score of 320.1 against 21.0 over 100 days. Mirabegron contributed exactly none of it, which is the practical finding.
Chloe Moon6 min read
Varicose Veins
A meta-analysis of 7,844 patients found cyanoacrylate and radiofrequency ablation equivalent on closure, with less bruising and numbness after glue. The harms that separate them are the ones a meta-analysis of this size cannot measure.
David Seo7 min read
Prostate
In 1,445,144 patients, 92.4 percent were on treatment inside two months. Watchful waiting is a guideline option for mild symptoms and it is barely visible in the national data.
Andrew Cho5 min read
Haemorrhoids
Over a median 13.3 years the hazard ratio was 1.073. In the group that had surgery or treatment it was 0.941 — and that second interval touches 1, which is the part worth being careful about.
Chloe Moon6 min read
Urinary Tract Infection
4,436 emergency visits across fourteen summers. A 20 percent rise in temperature carried an odds ratio of 1.06 overall — and 1.14 in people with diabetes.
Chloe Moon6 min read
Prostate Cancer
50.6 percent high-risk across a decade, with the low-risk share falling from 11.4 to 7.6 percent. 55.4 percent of high-risk cases came from rural areas against 47.7 percent from urban ones.
Andrew Cho6 min read
Varicose Veins
Foam sclerotherapy sent 56.4 percent of patients back for another procedure against 8.2 percent after laser. At fourteen years all three groups reported the same symptom scores — which makes the question what you are willing to count as a cost.
David Seo7 min read
Prostate
Prostate volume rises from 24.7 to 33.7 grams across three decades while peak flow falls from 20 to 13.8 mL/s. The sample is large, and it is not a random sample of Korean men.
Andrew Cho6 min read
Obesity
Total weight loss peaked at 27.5 percent at eighteen months and settled at 24.7 percent at two years. Diabetes remission went the other way, rising from 80.7 to 85.7 percent.
David Seo6 min read
Prostate Cancer
45.6 percent against 33.8 percent for surgery; 42.3 against 59.7 percent for hormone therapy. The cost difference came from how long the systemic treatment ran, not from its monthly price.
James Choi6 min read
Overactive Bladder
Mean symptom score fell from 6.9 to 4.6 and every bladder-diary measure improved. The number worth carrying is the other one: 43.4 percent reached the threshold that counts as a real change.
Andrew Cho6 min read
Varicose Veins
Most studies of standing work and varicose veins ask people whether they have them. This one scanned 414 nurses instead, which is why its answer carries more weight than its size suggests.
Chloe Moon6 min read
Haemorrhoids
A 467,567-person national cohort measured diagnosis and surgery as separate events. High income predicted being diagnosed. Alcohol predicted being operated on.
David Seo5 min read
Urinary Tract Infection
National surveillance of 885 patients puts numbers on a drug most people are still prescribed first. Fosfomycin was 94.9 percent effective. Ciprofloxacin was closer to a coin toss.
Andrew Cho6 min read
Obesity
Weight down 22.1 kg, waist down 17.4 cm, and which operation they had made no difference to the outcome. Just over half reached the 20 percent weight-loss threshold.
David Seo6 min read
Prostate Cancer
27,075 biopsy-confirmed cases from 51 hospitals. Eligibility dropped from 27.6 percent in 2010 to 22.0 percent in 2020, and it varies by almost thirteen points depending on where a man lives.
Catherine Cho6 min read
Varicose Veins
National claims data show the patient count rising 53 percent and the operation being replaced. The share of those patients who had an ulcer halved over the same period — which is a change in who is being treated, not only in how.
James Choi7 min read
Haemorrhoids
Prevalence was 16.6 percent among 194,620 people examined by colonoscopy at a health check. Women outranked men overall — but only the women who had given birth.
James Choi5 min read
Sexual Health
52,009 cases across 250 municipalities in one year, with hotspots in metropolitan and south-eastern areas. The strongest municipal correlate was the share of households with one person in them.
Andrew Cho7 min read
Sexual Health
Six of the model's seven authors work for the vaccine manufacturer. The professional society that has revised its guidance four times in a decade does not.
Andrew Cho7 min read
Sexual Health
Two national claims analyses of the same decade show cost climbing almost three times faster than caseload, alongside a treatment mix that diverged sharply by sex.
Andrew Cho7 min read
Screening
Breast screening data from 2009 to 2021 separate the two channels. In the government programme, less-educated women participated more. In individually initiated screening, the advantaged did — by almost two to one.
James Choi7 min read
Screening
Among 64,674 Korean patients who developed hepatocellular carcinoma, 51.9 percent of those screened at six-month intervals received curative treatment. Among those never screened, 34.5 percent did.
Chloe Moon7 min read
Screening
Among women aged 30 to 44 who had a hysterectomy, the screening rate was 77.8 percent — higher than in women who still have a uterus. Meanwhile overall cervical screening has been falling since 2013, fastest in the poorest groups.
Catherine Cho7 min read
Screening
Low-dose CT screening reached 51.2 percent of eligible heavy smokers by 2023, up from 24.7 percent. Higher-income groups took it up more consistently throughout.
James Choi6 min read
Screening
In 8.3 million women the adjusted mortality rate ratio was 0.43. The study's authors published a second number alongside it that shows why the first cannot be read at face value.
James Choi8 min read
Screening
In a cohort of 5.9 million Koreans, ever being screened carried an odds ratio of 0.74 for colorectal cancer death. The authors report the opposite result in the oldest group, and recommend an upper age limit.
Chloe Moon6 min read
Kidney Stones
SUSPEND found 80 percent of the placebo group avoided further intervention against 81 percent on tamsulosin. A Korean trial that asked a different question — after shockwave, at half the dose — found something the large trial did not test.
Catherine Cho8 min read
Screening
A Korean vignette study of 1,229 people found willingness to use a low-value MRI rising from around a third to nearly all once the price fell. The inequality in who used it narrowed, because everyone converged on the test that does not help.
Catherine Cho6 min read
Kidney Stones
Allopurinol lowers urate by making less of it; benzbromarone lowers it by pushing more into the urine. In 61,300 matched Korean patients, the second route carried a 56 percent higher rate of urinary stones.
Andrew Cho7 min read
Screening
In a German population cohort, 3,371 people had whole-body MRI and 1,369 incidental findings were disclosed. Biopsies rose. The rate of biopsies returning no cancer rose faster than the rate returning one.
Catherine Cho7 min read
Kidney Stones
In 117,006 matched pairs from the National Health Insurance Service, patients starting an SGLT2 inhibitor had a nephrolithiasis rate of 0.65 per 100 person-years against 1.12 on a DPP-4 inhibitor. The relative benefit was larger in people who had never had a stone; the absolute benefit was larger in those who had.
Chloe Moon7 min read
Screening
An analysis of 190 comprehensive programmes at ten Seoul university hospitals found the overnight package averaging 24.08 mSv — for people with no symptoms. Two programmes with the same stated purpose differed by 2.1 times.
James Choi7 min read
Kidney Stones
NOSTONE randomised 416 recurrent stone formers to hydrochlorothiazide at 12.5, 25 or 50 mg or placebo. Recurrence was 59, 59, 56 and 49 percent, in that order, with no dose-response and more harm on the drug.
Catherine Cho7 min read
Screening
In 16.6 million Koreans, upper endoscopy carried an odds ratio of 0.53 for gastric cancer death. The barium series offered alongside it carried 0.98. The gap widened with every repeat endoscopy.
Chloe Moon7 min read
Kidney Stones
A time-series analysis of six Korean cities found urolithiasis presentations rising with daily mean temperature and falling with humidity. The effect arrives fast enough to be planned for.
James Choi6 min read
Screening
The Cochrane review of general health checks found no effect on mortality across 233,298 people. Korea's own national programme contains a test that halves the odds of dying of gastric cancer. Both findings are correct, and the bundle contains both kinds of test.
James Choi8 min read
Kidney Stones
Two national cohort studies of the same decade agree on the lifetime risk and disagree on whether the disease is still spreading. The number that decides what happens after the pain stops is neither of those.
Andrew Cho7 min read
Kidney Stones
Shockwave lithotripsy is still the operation Korea performs most for urinary stones. The scan that finds them rose 394.8 percent — in a disease that recurs, in patients who are mostly of working age.
Andrew Cho7 min read
Prostate
This coverage has asked repeatedly what happens to the men Korea finds late. The answer, in national prescribing data, is androgen deprivation — and two studies now put numbers on what that costs.
Andrew Cho7 min read
Prostate
The country that became the world's reference case for finding cancer too early has the opposite problem in prostate cancer. This is what the published data shows, where it runs out, and what it never recorded at all.
Andrew Cho9 min read
Prostate
Three articles here have described what prostate surgery does to continence and none has described the alternative. Randomised patient-reported data and two Korean series fill the gap — and disagree about how much is happening, for a reason worth knowing.
Andrew Cho7 min read
Prostate
Pooled data on 12,620 men finds age, urethral length and existing urinary symptoms predict continence after robotic prostatectomy. All three are measurable at the clinic visit where the decision is made.
Andrew Cho6 min read
Prostate
A target trial emulation using national linkage data found four prostate cancer deaths in total between surgery and surveillance. The finding it could measure was psychological.
Andrew Cho6 min read
Prostate
In 27,075 biopsy-confirmed cases from 51 hospitals, 53.9 percent were high-risk at diagnosis and the low-risk share fell from 11.4 to 7.6 percent over a decade. Rural men fared worse than urban ones.
Andrew Cho6 min read
Thyroid
Korea found more thyroid cancer than any country in history and almost none of the extra deaths that would justify it. This is what the published evidence establishes, and where it stops.
Chloe Moon8 min read
Thyroid
Meta-analysis puts transient nerve injury after transaxillary surgery at 1 percent. A Korean series that laryngoscoped every patient found 4.1 percent — in a cohort whose average patient was 41 years old with an 11 mm tumour.
David Seo6 min read
Thyroid
Overdiagnosis only matters because treatment costs something. Two 2026 meta-analyses quantify what it costs — and both contain numbers that will be misread if the intervals around them are dropped.
David Seo6 min read
Thyroid
Higher-income Koreans were screened more, diagnosed more and suffered more surgical complications. Lower-income Koreans died more. When the country stopped over-screening, the higher-income group stopped first.
James Choi6 min read
Thyroid
The paper reported thyroid cancer-specific mortality rising from 0.76 to 2.70 per 1,000 person-years. The national registry's reply says that is a case fatality rate, and that population mortality fell from 1.06 to 0.80 per 100,000 over almost the same period.
James Choi6 min read
Thyroid
In a 927-patient national cohort, higher income and prior awareness of active surveillance independently predicted choosing it. Two in 8,969 Korean patients with these tumours have died of them.
Catherine Cho6 min read
Thyroid
National registry data has the standardised rate falling from 75.06 to 42.50 per 100,000 in three years, then climbing to 60.13 by 2021. The renewed rise includes distant-stage disease, which overdetection does not produce.
Chloe Moon6 min read
Gallbladder
Korea removes three times as many gallbladders as it did fifteen years ago. This is what the published evidence establishes about that operation, and where it runs out.
James Choi8 min read
Gallbladder
One pooled 1.77 million patients and found no difference. The other pooled 412,000 and found triple the risk. They are less contradictory than they look, and neither settles the question.
David Seo6 min read
Gallbladder
A society review of subtotal cholecystectomy puts bile duct injury at 0.3 percent and overall complications at 24.7 percent. That trade needs stating whenever a low conversion rate is offered as proof of surgical quality.
David Seo6 min read
Gallbladder
Cancer, diabetes, kidney disease, depression: study after study from the National Health Insurance Service reports raised risk after cholecystectomy. In the two that separated early risk from late, the excess was concentrated in the first years and then disappeared.
James Choi7 min read
Gallbladder
A prospective study across 18 Korean academic hospitals put surgery-related complications at 2.5 percent and bile duct injury at 0.7 percent. Seventeen injuries in 2,514 operations is a small foundation for the risk calculator built on it.
David Seo6 min read
Gallbladder
Two propensity-matched Korean series of moderate-to-severe acute cholecystitis found no complication benefit from drainage before laparoscopic cholecystectomy. The delay that predicted harm was the patient's, not the surgeon's.
David Seo6 min read
Gallbladder
A commentary from Peking Union Medical College Hospital says the new 10–14 mm category needs prospective validation. The guideline's authors agree it does — and published the recommendation anyway.
Catherine Cho5 min read
Gallbladder
Nationwide insurance data shows the age-standardised rate rising from 67.7 to 211.4 per 100,000. Its authors name increasing computed tomography use as a probable primary cause.
James Choi5 min read
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