2. Outline
• Introduction
• Determinants of disease prevention
• Types of levels of disease prevention
• Summary of levels of disease prevention
• Reference
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3. Objective
• Understand concept of disease prevention
• Understand determinants of disease prevention
• Understand different levels of disease
prevention
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4. Introduction
• Disease prevention means to interrupt or slow the
progression of disease.
• Fluctuation in patterns of morbidity and mortality
over time in countries and the observation that
migrants slowly develop the patterns of disease of
host populations indicate that causes of disease are
preventable.
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5. Determinants of disease Prevention
• Successful prevention depends upon:
Knowledge of causation,
Dynamics of transmission,
Identification of risk factors and risk groups,
Availability of prophylactic or early detection and
treatment measures.
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6. Types of levels of disease preventions
• There are three level of preventions.
1. Primordial prevention
2. Primary prevention
3. Secondary prevention
4. Tertiary prevention
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7. Primordial prevention
• It consists of actions to minimize future hazards to
health.
• Focuses on inhibiting the establishment factors (
environmental ,economic, social, behavioral and
cultural ) known to increase the risk of disease.
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8. • It addresses broad health determinants rather than
preventing specific disease.
• Example :
– Government policy: Increasing taxes on cigarettes
– Physical activity
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9. Primary prevention
• Is the action taken prior to the onset of disease, which
removes the possibility that the disease will ever
occur.
• Primary prevention keeps the disease process from
becoming established by eliminating causes of
disease or increasing resistance to disease.
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10. • Primary prevention has three components.
Health promotion
Prevention of exposure
Prevention of disease
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11. Health promotion
• Consists of general non-specific interventions that
enhance health and the body's ability to resist disease.
• Examples of health promotion are improvement of
socio economic status, provision of adequate food,
housing, clothing, and education.
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12. Prevention of exposure
• Is the avoidance of factors which may cause disease if
an individual is exposed to them.
• Examples can be provision of safe and adequate
water, proper excreta disposal, and vector control.
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13. Prevention of disease
• Is the prevention of disease development after the
individual has become exposed to the disease causing
factors.
• Immunization is an example of prevention of disease .
• Immunization does not prevent an infectious organism
from invading the immunized host, but does prevent it
from establishing an infection.
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14. Secondary prevention
• Is the action which halts the progress of a disease at
its incipient stage and prevents complications.
• Secondary prevention can be achieved through
detecting people who already have the disease as
early as possible and treat them.
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15. • The specific interventions are: early diagnosis (e.g.
screening tests, and case finding programs….) and
adequate treatment.
• It is carried out before the person is permanently
damaged. Example: Prevention of blindness from
Trachoma
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16. Tertiary prevention
• All the measures available to reduce or limit
impairments and disabilities, and to promote the
patients’ adjustment to irremediable conditions.
• Needed in some diseases because primary and
secondary preventions have failed, are not effective.
• Targeted towards people with permanent damage or
disability.
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17. • It has two objectives:
Treatment to prevent further disability or death.
To limit the physical, psychological, social, and
financial impact of disability. This can be done
through rehabilitation , which is the retraining of
the remaining functions for maximal effectiveness.
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18. • Example: When a person becomes blind due to
vitamin A deficiency, tertiary prevention
(rehabilitation) can help the blind or partly blind
person learn to do gainful work and be economically
self supporting.
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19. Summary of Levels of Prevention
Stage of disease Level of prevention Type of response
Pre-disease Primary Prevention Health promotion and
Specific protection
Latent Disease Secondary prevention Pre-symptomatic
Diagnosis and
treatment
Symptomatic Disease Tertiary prevention •Disability limitation for
early symptomatic disease
•Rehabilitation for late
Symptomatic disease
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Editor's Notes
e. Hence, epidemiology plays a central role in disease prevention by identifying those modifiable causes.
The major purpose in investigating the epidemiology of diseases is to
learn how to prevent and control them
It signifies intervention in the pre-pathogenesis phase of a disease or health problem.
Life style and behavioral changes
The earlier the disease is diagnosed, and treated the better it is for prognosis of the case and in the prevention of the occurrence of other secondary cases.
It thus protects others from in the community from acquiring the infection and thus provide at once secondary prevention for the infected ones and primary prevention for their potential contacts.
