Katafuchi, Ritsuko
Nagae, Hiroshi
Masutani, Kosuke
Tsuruya, Kazuhiko
Mitsuiki, Koji
Article History
Received: 27 March 2018
Accepted: 16 July 2018
First Online: 31 July 2018
Compliance with ethical standards
:
: The authors have declared that no conflict of interest exists.
: All procedures performed in this study were in accordance with ethical standards of the Hospital Review Board (IRB)/Ethic Committees at National Fukuoka Higashi Medical Center and Fukuoka Red Cross Hospital (IRB approval numbers: 28–37 and 351, respectively) and with Ethical Guidelines for Medical and Health Research Involving Human Subjects by Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare in Japan.
: Since this was a retrospective study and used a preexisting database while employing the highest privacy policy standards, the investigators shall not necessarily be required to obtain informed consent. However, we made public information concerning this study on the web (ExternalRef removed and ExternalRef removed) and ensured the opportunities for the research subjects to refuse utilizing their personal information.