Tuberculosis: An Infectious Disease

Tuberculosis is most of the feared and widespread that has harassed humans. Tuberculosis is a disease that affects the lungs and other organs too. This is a very serious disease that can cause death and the worse part is that this disease travels to one person to another. In the book, Know about Tuberculosis, a boy who has tuberculosis sneezed on another boy named Kevin who did not automatically catch tuberculosis, but the terms have taken root. According to the book, Know about Tuberculosis, “In the United States, about ten to fifteen million people are infected with this disease, but only ten percent of people are infected; however doctors assume that the battle against tuberculosis is increasing around the world.” Tuberculosis is among the major concerns for the World Health Organization due to its contagious nature.

Tuberculosis has been part of human history for a long time but how long is a long time? Recent research using genetic data has allowed us to know that the tuberculosis progenitor has been on this planet for about 3 million years affecting even our earlier ancestors (Gutierrez et al, 2005). Additionally this research showed that the bacilli from tuberculosis are capable of mixing sections of their genome with other strains and giving the pathogen a composite assembly, which resulted from ancient horizontal exchanges before its clonal expansion. This quality provided tuberculosis a big advantage that even now a days allows the organism to evade, adapt and create resistance to treatments that were once successful. In order to fix current and

The social aspect looks at how TB affects the overall impact of health related quality of life. The global section looks at the barriers of governmental funds and treatment access in different developed versus developing countries. The environmental section explores the environmental conditions in where TB impacts socioeconomic factors, including income, education, housing, age, gender, and geographic distribution. The policy section explores the policy around the treatment of TB, providing distributions of policies (funding, allocative health policies and regulated health policies) and organized policymaking processes at the federal level that allow for the improvement of the health of the population.

Tuberculosis or TB is a bacterial infection that spreads through the bloodstream and is commonly found in the lungs (webMD.com). This infection is highly contagious can spread rapidly through air, but remain undetected because the bacteria can live in the body in an inactive form (webMD.com). This disease originated in Russian prisons, where inmates would be malnourished, alcoholics, and smokers (Willumsen & Shinefield, 2001). Since the bacteria lives in the body in the inactive form, people who are exposed and may have TB never develops any symptoms (webMD.com). The bacterium becomes active when the immune system weakens (mayoclinic.org). The active form of TB can result in coughs, sneezes, and spits (mayoclinic.org).

The purpose of this paper is to discuss tuberculosis (TB), provide a clinical description, and discuss the determinants of health in relation to TB and the role and tasks of the community health nurse in regards to the disease.

On May 2007, there was an international manhunt for Andrew Speaker. His face was plastered all over the news and there was an urgency to capture him. For a brief period he was the most wanted individual in the United States and finding his location at that current time was of the upmost priority (Altman, 2007). The only crime Andre had committed was that fact that he was in cohorts with Tuberculosis. When they finally found him, they put him in quarantine. Why this grave precaution? What had made him the most wanted man in the world and what is the story behind Tuberculosis?

Tuberculosis (TB) is a chronic bacterial infection that affects millions of people globally. It is a contagious disease that is spread through the air, and it usually affects the lungs. It is transmitted from person to person through droplets from the respiratory tract of those who are already infected with the disease. Some who are infected with the bacteria that causes TB often exhibit no symptoms, because their immune systems stop the bacteria from growing and multiplying. Those with compromised immune systems are more susceptible to developing the full blown disease which can cause symptoms that include coughing, spitting blood, chest pains, weakness, weight loss, and fever. Tuberculosis can be treated with a six to nine month course of a combination of antibiotics. If left untreated, TB will spread and can be fatal.

Tuberculosis is an infectious bacterial disease caused by the pathogen, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, and most often found in the lungs. It is transmitted via droplets from the throat and lungs of those with active respiratory disease. People with weakened immune systems can make the bacteria active which causes death of tissue in the organs infected. Symptoms usually consists of overall sensation of feeling unwell, cough, possibly with bloody mucus, fatigue, shortness of breath, weight loss, low-grade fever, night sweats, and chest pain when breathing. To stop further transmission of tuberculosis, finding patients and giving appropriate treatment as well as rapid detection of pathogen and drug resistance is effective. Typing of M. tuberculosis

Today we call it Tuberculosis, and, growing up as a child of the 80’s, my only exposure to TB was in the educational game, The Oregon Trail. Indeed, in the United States, TB is not something frequently seen. It is so rare in the U.S. that, according to an Al Jazeera interview with Dr. Caitlin Reed, medical director of the inpatient TB unit at UCLA’s Olive View Medical Center, “patients are often initially misdiagnosed, placing both the patient and the people with whom the patient interacts at risk” (Cengel, 2014).

Communicable diseases occurs in every country regardless of urban, rural, or with socio economical diversities. In order to help in prevention and control of communicable diseases, locally, nationally and globally, nurses who are working with the public health system , must have basic understanding of epidemiology, microbiology, treatments, and knowledge about public health system and the legal system. Although, the United states attained a significant success in attaining the control over

Now that you have been diagnosed with tuberculosis (TB) disease, let us talk about some of the medications, known as anti-tuberculosis medications, the doctor is likely to prescribe. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there are ten different drugs that can be used to treat TB, with the “first-line anti-TB” medications being: isoniazid (INH), rifampin (RIF), etherambutol (EMB), and pyrazinamide (PZA) (CDC, 2016). These are taken in pill form, by mouth. The two phases of treatment are the intensive phase, where you will take INH, RIF, PZA, and EMB; and the continuation phase, where you will be taking INH and RIF. There are a few different options for dosing. The CDC states that for the intensive phase you

This section highlights the extent and dimensions of tuberculosis, important determinants, and the health system and/or public health program initiatives that are in place to address the issues.

Tuberculosis is defined as a serious, infectious disease that is known to target one of the body’s main, vital organs, the lungs. Tuberculosis (TB) is a mycobacterium disease and is air bourn spread. An air bourn spread disease can be contracted from simply one person sneezing around you who is infected. Tuberculosis presents itself as a Public Health issue. In epidemiological perspective, researchers have dedicated enormous amounts of time and money into the prevention of TB. I believe that TB is in interest to the public because of its fatal consequence and its ability to go from host to host in a very timely manner. TB epidemics began to increase in the 1980’s due to larger sums of people who were inflected with HIV. (1998). When infected with HIV the human immune system becomes very weak and fragile and cannot fight off bad bacteria. Organizations in Canada such as the Public Health Network Council and Canada’s Center for Disease Control work on the prevention of Fatal diseases such as TB. The Pan- Canadian Public Health Network also provides Canadians the information that they need to know on infectious diseases and provides preventative techniques. Managing TB is an art, as well as a science. The quote by the World Health Organization sums it up pretty well. “Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. ” As well as being physically “scientifically” healthy, the mental health aspect needs to

Worldwide, tuberculosis is a persistent issue in global health. India alone carries over 25% of the global TB burden, with over 9 million people suffering from active TB infection each year (Central TB Division 2015). Of growing concern is the rise of multi- and extensively- drug resistant tuberculosis (MDR and XDR, respectively). Characterized by resistance to standard first-line antibiotics including isoniazid and rifampicin (Loddenkemper et al. 2002), MDR-TB requires more aggressive and costly treatment, but as associated with poorer response to treatment and higher rates of mortality (Chung-Delgado et al. 2015). Drug-resistant TB in India has been rising at an alarming rate in India, with 2.2% of all new cases and 15% of all retreatment cases showing signs of resistance to first-line antibiotics (WHO 2015). Yet, despite the growing burden of MDR-TB, the WHO estimates that only 36% of all MDR-TB cases in India are notified (WHO 2015).

Still tuberculosis remains one of the most leading cause of morbidity and mortality among many developing countries. After the revolution of chemotherapy in the 1940s and modification of the standardized short courses in the 1980s, there was a believe that tuberculosis well be declined internationally. This declined was obvious in the developed countries but it was not evident in the developing countries. TB continues to be an international problem for many reasons including: