Pharmacology Assignment 81789054
Question 6. Define and provide an example of the following epidemiology terms
- a) Incidence of a disease
This is the rate of occurrence of new cases of a particular disease arising in a given period in a specific population. The incidence of a disease in a research study presents in the form of a rate. This rate represents the number of new events in a particular period over the number of persons exposed to risk during this period per 10n people. The numerator refers to the first events of disease while the denominator refers to the sum of all the disease-free person time 000periods during the period of observation of the population at risk. For instance, the incidence rate of stroke in a population of 118 539 women who are 30-55 years of age will be 30.2 per 100 000 person-years of observation. This is if the number of stroke cases since the beginning of the study is 274 cases and the study took eight years, which is equal to 908 447 person-years.
- b) Prevalence
This is the frequency of existing cases in a defined population at a given point in time. Prevalence is calculated as the number of people with a particular disease or condition at a specified time over the number of individuals in the population at risk during the same period per 100% or per 1000 population. For instance, the prevalence of type 2 diabetes among 50 women who are at risk of getting type 2 diabetes will be 16%. This will be true if eight women among these women who are in danger of getting type 2 diabetes gets diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. The prevalence of type 2 diabetes among these women can also be 160 per 1000 population.
- c) Morbidity rate
This is the frequency with which the cases of a particular disease appears in a population. Morbidity rate constitutes of measures of morbidity that comprises measures such as incidence rate, cumulative incidence, attack rate, and prevalence. Examples of sources of morbidity rate data include sources such as the hospital admissions records, primary health care consultation records, discharge records, outpatient records, the registers of disease events and the specialist service records. These sources provide the basis for the calculations of the measures of morbidity mentioned above.
- d) Communicable disease
This is a disease that occurs due to the transmission of a particular pathogenic agent to a susceptible host. The transmission of the pathogenic agent can either be directly from an infected patient or animal to a healthy person or indirectly through vectors, airborne particles or vehicles. Examples of the common communicable diseases include diseases like malaria which spreads as a result of the transmission of Plasmodium parasites from an infected Anopheles mosquito to a healthy person, tuberculosis that spreads as a consequence of the transmission of Mycobacterium tuberculosis from an infected person to a healthy person, acute respiratory infections that occur as a result of bacterial infections to the respiratory tract and diarrheal diseases that occur due to ingesting infected food and water.
- e) Contagious disease
This is a disease that can spread from an infected patient to a normal healthy person without the intervention of a vector. Contagious diseases mostly spread from one person to another when the infected patient touches a healthy person. Examples of the commonly diagnosed contagious disease include diseases such as measles, syphilis, Ebola disease, enterovirus D68 infections, hepatitis B infections and Hantavirus infection.
- f) Sporadic disease
This is a disease that occurs irregularly in single or scattered cases. They occur in the absence of any environmental or inherited causative agent. Examples of sporadic diseases include diseases such as sporadic breast cancer, sporadic fatal insomnia and sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease.
- g) Endemic disease
This is a communicable disease that has a relatively stable pattern of occurrence in a given geographical area or a given population group at a relatively high prevalence and incidence. The diseases that are considered to be endemic include diseases such as malaria that is prevalent in the tropical regions, smallpox in Europe and dengue fever which occur within the tropical regions.
- h) Epidemic disease
This is a disease that occurs at a higher rate than the normal expected rate of the disease’s occurrence in a given community or region at a particular period. For a disease to qualify as an epidemic the number of cases needed to qualify the disease as an epidemic will depend on the agent causing the disease, the size of the population exposed to illness and the type and susceptibility of the population exposed to the disease. Examples of diseases that are commonly epidemic include diseases such as Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome, malaria, cholera, epidemic typhus, smallpox and polio.
- i) Pandemic disease
This is the spread of a new disease around the world. This happens when cases of the disease’s new infection are reported from all over the world due to the spread of the causative agent of the disease to various places around the world by the infected patients that are moving around the world. Examples of cases of diseases that become pandemic include diseases like pandemic influenza disease, HIV/AIDS and H1N1 pandemic.
- j) Zoonotic disease
This is a disease that can spread between animals and people. The disease occurs as a result of infections from organisms such as viruses, bacteria, parasites and fungi which are transmitted from the animals to human beings. Examples of Zoonotic diseases include diseases such as Cryptosporidiosis which affects humans and animals such as cattle and pigs due to Cryptosporidium infections, Trichinellosis which affects both humans and livestock because of Trichinella infections and roundworm and hookworm infections from pets such as cats which affect people who are in contact with them.
Question Seven: Define the following infection control terms
- a) Aseptic technique
This refers to a method or a set of strict rules and guidelines that are used to prevent the contamination of surfaces and objects by microorganisms during medical procedures in the areas such as outpatient care clinic and other clinics when handling of the syringe vaccines, surgery rooms when handling surgical equipment and in the hospital when accessing dialysis catheter or when performing dialysis to the patients with renal complications.
- b) Sanitization
This is the process of making a particular object or surface completely clean and free from the contamination caused by infectious microorganisms such as pathogenic bacteria, infectious viruses and other infectious microorganisms that might be found on the surfaces or on the objects which can cause infections. This process requires the use of a disinfectant to remove the microorganisms.
- c) Disinfectants
These are the antimicrobial agents with a particular set of necessary chemical properties which are used to destroy and kill the infectious microorganisms found on the surface of the nonliving agents. The disinfectant does not completely make the cleaned surface or object. Examples of these disinfectants include substances such as aldehydes, oxidizing agents, alcohol, air disinfectants and phenolics.
- d) Autoclave
This is a strongly heated container which is used to sterilize various types of equipment and apparatus at a high temperature and pressure due to the ability of the container to withstand the necessary high pressure and temperature needed for sterilization.
- e) Antiseptics
These are antimicrobial substances that are used to reduce the chances of an infection occurring to a particular tissue, sepsis, and putrefaction of a particular living tissue or the skin when applied to that particular living tissue or skin.
- f) Radiation
This is the use of radiation lights to destroy the available the microorganisms that are present on objects or the various surfaces. The process includes two methods of radiation sterilization such as the use of ionizing sterilization and the use of non-ionizing sterilization techniques.
- g) Sterile technique
This refers to the process by which one manipulates the cultures of a particular microorganism without infecting the person doing the experiment, without contaminating the culture, or the laboratory equipment used in the culture experiment.
- h) Sepsis
This is the process where harmful bacteria, other pathogenic microorganisms, and their toxins enter the tissues of the body through the infections of a wound and causes the body to give an overwhelming response, which injures its organs and tissues in the process.
- i) Desiccation
This is the process of controlling the growth and multiplication of microorganism through the complete removal of water from tissues, which slows its growth or makes it inactive.
- j) Ultrasonic waves
This is the process of cleaning equipment and apparatus through the use of ultrasound waves and an appropriate cleaning solvent to clean the various equipment. The cleaning solvents are used to enhance the effect of the ultrasound.
- k) Pasteurization
This is the partial sterilization of foods and drisnks such as a milk and canned foods at a high temperature and for a specific period of exposure that destroys the objectionable organisms without major chemical changes of that particular substance. The process mainly involves the use of heat to remove or inactivate any pathogenic microorganisms.
- l) Filtration
This is the process of cleaning a particular substance through the exclusion of organisms basing on the sizes of the microorganisms and is mostly used to remove microbes from solutions that may be sensitive to some sterilization techniques such as heating.
- m) Sterilization
It is the through process of removing or killing bacteria and other pathogenic microorganizims through chemical methods, radiation, gas plasma, filtration, and heat among other techniques. The process focuses on ensuring that all pathogenic microroganizms are killed.
- n) Disinfection
This refers to the process of cleaning to prevent pathogenic microorganizms that may cause an infection such as bacteria from being active through the use of specialized techniques by not necessarily killing the antimicrobial agents, as in sterilization; but the process can also involve making them inactive. These techniques may include heat disinfection and chemical disinfection depending on the process involved.
