Comprehensive Care through Family Medicine: Improving the Sustainability of Aging Societies.

Comprehensive care through family medicine can enhance the approach to multimorbidity, interprofessional collaboration, and community care, and make medical care more sustainable for older people. This study investigated the effect of implementing family medicine and the comprehensiveness of medical care in one of the most rural communities. This implementation research used medical care data from April 2015 to March 2020.

Rural Social Participation through Osekkai during the COVID-19 Pandemic.

We investigated the effects of enabling Osekkai, the traditional Japanese behavior of creating a helping culture, on social participation among rural people in rebuilding social connections that can be vital during the coronavirus diseases 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. The subjects of this cross-sectional study were people interested in the Osekkai conference (control group) and those actively involved in Osekkai activities (exposure group). The primary outcome of social participation was measured as the frequency of meeting and the number of friends or acquaintances.

Effects of Implementation of Infection Control Measures against COVID-19 on the Condition of Japanese Rural Nursing Homes.

This study aimed to clarify the effect of coronavirus disease (hereafter, COVID-19) control on patients' health conditions and staff's working conditions in rural nursing homes. An interventional study including all staff and patients in a rural nursing home was performed from 1 April 2019 to 31 March 2021. Infection control measures against COVID-19 were initiated on 1 April 2020.

White Nail as a Static Physical Finding: Revitalization of Physical Examination.

Physical examinations are critical for diagnosis and should be differentiated into static and dynamic categories. One of the static findings is white nail, such as Terry's and Lindsay's nails. Here, we report the cases of two older patients with acute diseases who had nail changes that aided evaluation of their clinical course.

Elliptical shadow on the cervical spinal cord.

Chiari type 1 deformation can show progressive degenerative neurological presentation in the elderly.

Association between transient appetite loss and vitamin B1 deficiency in elderly patients with suspected deficiency.

Background: There is scarce evidence associating vitamin B1 levels and appetite loss duration in elderly patients with suspected B1 deficiency. We aimed to investigate this association in elderly hospitalized patients with suspected vitamin B1 deficiency in rural Japan.

Methods: This cross-sectional study evaluated 309 elderly patients (aged ≥ 65 years) admitted to one rural Hospital between April 2017 and March 2019.

Fears Related to COVID-19 among Rural Older People in Japan.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has affected people's social lives by inhibiting their movement; this seriously impacts the lives of older people in particular. Rural older people may have been particularly affected because they live dispersedly and in isolation. This study explored rural older people's perceptions of how COVID-19 has impacted their social lives.

The Implementation of a Clinical Ladder in Rural Japanese Nursing Education: Effectiveness and Challenges.

The clinical ladder is an essential tool for nursing education, enabling nurses to ascend from novice to expert. The learning content for nurses can depend on their clinical situations. The aging of societies has changed the demand for nurses at community hospitals because of the multimorbidity of older patients.

The effect of social fear on the establishment of fever standards in rural hospitals during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic.

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has complicated the work of general physicians due to the vagueness of fever standards. Because of the high virulence of the causative virus, the disease is rapidly spreading worldwide, even reaching the rural areas in Japan. During the first wave of the pandemic, the Japanese government set the standard as a temperature of 37.

Improvement in palliative care quality in rural nursing homes through information and communication technology-driven interprofessional collaboration.

Introduction: Information and communication technology (ICT) can facilitate long-term care. In long-term care, effective communication among healthcare professionals is vital to reduce inappropriate emergency transfer and eventual death in hospitals. As nursing homes in rural areas lack adequate healthcare resources, ICT can reduce the burden on professionals, leading to adequate long-term care.

Impact of COVID-19 on the analytical diagnosing ability of family medicine residents.

This article described the difficulties of family medicine residents regarding diagnostic skill training during the pandemic of COVID-19. Social impact may strongly affect clinical reasoning skills.

Educational Intervention to Improve Citizen's Healthcare Participation Perception in Rural Japanese Communities: A Pilot Study.

In this mixed-methods study, we hypothesized that social cognitive theory (SCT)-based educational interventions for healthcare participation can improve the self-efficacy of older rural citizens in participating in their health management without any difficulties. Quasi-experimental study before and after SCT-based educational interventions and semi-structured interviews were conducted. Participants were Japanese elderly (>65 years) from rural communities.

The Uncertainty of COVID-19 Inducing Social Fear and Pressure on the Continuity of Rural, Community-Based Medical Education: A Thematic Analysis.

Rural community-based medical education (CBME) enriches undergraduate and postgraduate students' learning but has been impacted by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. We identified the challenges faced by stakeholders as well as the relevant solutions to provide recommendations for sustainable CBME in community hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic. A total of 31 pages of field and reflection notes were collated through direct observation and used for analysis.

Risk of Hospital Readmission among Older Patients Discharged from the Rehabilitation Unit in a Rural Community Hospital: A Retrospective Cohort Study.

Rehabilitation for hospitalized older people can improve their independence for performing activities of daily living (ADL), but determining its appropriateness can be challenging because of inherent limitations in their ADL and short life expectancy. Thus, we aimed to clarify the benefit of rehabilitation among older Japanese patients. We retrospectively evaluated consecutive older patients (age > 65 years) admitted to the rehabilitation unit of a rural community hospital between 1 April 2016 and 31 March 2020.

The Smiles of Older People through Recreational Activities: Relationship between Smiles and Joy.

Recreational activities are found to increase people's smiles, arising joy in older people, but there is limited research on this topic within the Japanese context. This cross-sectional study aimed to measure the quality and frequency of smiles in older people living in rural settings using a smile analysis application. The participants comprised 13 females aged over 65 years who lived in Unnan City, Japan, and regularly attended recreational meetings.

The Contribution of Citizens to Community-Based Medical Education in Japan: A Systematic Review.

Community-based medical education (CBME) offers vital support to healthcare professionals in aging societies, which need medical trainees who understand comprehensive care. In teaching comprehensive care practices, CBME can involve citizens from the relevant community. This research synthesizes the impact of the involvement of communities on the learning of medical trainees in CBME.

Strengths and Challenges for Medical Students and Residents in Rural Japan.

Background And Objectives: In Japan, family medicine training is driven by community-based medical education (CBME) and is often provided in rural community hospitals and clinics. Although CBME's positive relationship to family medicine in rural community hospitals is proven, the learning processes of medical students and residents in rural community hospitals needs investigating. The objective of this study was to reveal medical students' and residents' changing motivations and learning behaviors, as well as the factors underpinning their transition between medical schools or tertiary hospitals and rural community hospitals.

[A Case of Malignant Transformation of Previously Diagnosed Oral Leukoplakia].

Oral leukoplakia is the most common premalignant and potentially malignant lesion of the oral mucosa. Several studies have reported that the prevalence of oral cancer in young people is increasingly rapidly. The patient in this report was a 47- year-old man who complained of left tongue discomfort.

Effectiveness and Challenges in Local Self-Governance: Multifunctional Autonomy in Japan.

Community organizing with government support, termed local self-governance (LSG), is a form of policy decentralization for community wellbeing through solutions tailored to local issues. One form of LSG is multifunctional autonomy, in which citizens can comprehensively manage their communities with government support. This study clarified the effect of multifunctional autonomy on healthy life expectancy by assessing related advantages and challenges in rural Japanese communities, using a mixed-methods approach.

Predicting factors of elderly patients' discharge to home after rehabilitation in rural Japan: a retrospective cohort study.

Introduction: The aging of society continues to progress in Japan. As aging is more pronounced in rural than in urban societies, rehabilitation can contribute to rural elderly patients' discharge to home after hospitalization for various causes. The relationship between rural elderly patients' improvement of motor and cognitive function in relation to activities of daily life (ADL) through rehabilitation and their discharge to home has not been clarified in rural communities.

Systematic scoping review of factors and measures of rurality: toward the development of a rurality index for health care research in Japan.

Background: Rural-urban health care disparities are an important topic in health services research. Hence, developing valid and reliable tools to measure rurality is needed to support high quality research. However, Japan, has no index to measure rurality for health care research.

Realist evaluation of interprofessional education in primary care through transprofessional role play: what primary care professionals learn together.

Interprofessional collaboration (IPC) is vital to primary care. Improving IPC requires cooperation between medical and other healthcare professionals. Transprofessional role plays can enhance the quality of IPC; thus, in this study, we conducted transprofessional role plays, based on existing theories regarding IPC and medical education, with healthcare professionals in primary care.