RT Book, Section
A1 Wallace, Robert B.
A2 Boulton, Matthew L.
A2 Wallace, Robert B.
SR Print(0)
ID 1182685730
T1 Screening for Early and Asymptomatic Conditions
T2 Maxcy-Rosenau-Last Public Health & Preventive Medicine, 16e
YR 2022
FD 2022
PB McGraw Hill
PP New York, NY
SN 9781259644511
LK accessmedicine.mhmedical.com/content.aspx?aid=1182685730
RD 2024/04/19
AB The  typical  natural  history  of  many  diseases  and  conditions  suggests  that  at  some  point  in  the  life  course  their  biological  onset  occurs,  during  or  after  conception,  and  progresses  at  varying  rates  until  it  become  clinically  evident.  This  interval  may  be  short,  such  as  for  neonatal  hearing  loss,  or  long-term,  as  in  Alzheimer’s  disease.  Some  diseases  may  never  become  clinically  manifest  and  thus  afford  little  clinical  harm.  This  may  occur  for  various  reasons  including  biological  variation,  often  not  well  understood,  or  the  occurrence  of  competing  clinical  events,  or  possibly  natural  or  clinically  mediated  environmental  modification  (called  “primary  prevention”).  Important  to  the  discussion  here,  the  harms  of  nascent  diseases  and  conditions  also  may  be  mitigated,  deferred  or  eliminated  by  the  early  and  asymptomatic  detection  of  disease;  that  is,  disease  screening  (also  called  “secondary  prevention”).  However,  even  when  an  overt  clinical  illness  is  already  present,  “tertiary  prevention”  can  offer  rehabilitative  and  other  clinical  interventions  that  may  deter  disease  progression  and  help  return  the  patient  to  a  healthier  state.