Population Health 102 - Rheumatic Heart Disease

Population Health 102
Rheumatic Heart Disease
Student Name
University Name
Author Note

1
Rheumatic heart disease is one of the prevailing conditions that has been diagnosed in
New Zealanders and other global nations which require immediate attention from the
authorities. It is required to adopt the Biopsychosocial Model to understand the influencing
factors of the condition and how to prevent them from happening henceforth. Rheumatic
heart disease is a disorder in which rheumatic fever causes irreversible damage to the heart
valves (Carapetis et al., 2016, pp. 1-24). Immediately after untreated or under-treated
streptococcal infection, such as strep throat or scarlet fever, damage to the heart valve may
evolve. Rheumatic fever is a preventable disease that is caused by an autoimmune response to
a highly contagious Group A Streptococcus (GAS) throat infection. It affects the body's
connective tissue, causing acute, debilitating arthritis as well as other side effects. Rheumatic
fever in some cases does long-term damage to the heart and its valves.
Acute Rheumatic Fever (ARF) is the consequence of an autoimmune responsemalfunction to
pharyngitis caused by infection with group A Streptococcus. The long-term damage to
cardiac valves caused by ARF, which can result from a single severe episode or from
multiple recurrent episodes of the illness, is known as rheumatic heart disease (RHD).RHD
has many morbidity and mortality in resource -poor settings all around of
world. ARF progress leads to different type of disease which can effect on different parts of
body such as joint pain and swelling, cardiac valvular regurgitation with the potential for
secondary heart failure, chorea, skin and subcutaneous manifestations and fever (Carapetis et
al., 2016, pp. 1-24).
According to Bennett et al., (2019, pp.633), RHD has affected 34 million people worldwide
and it is shown that an additional 47 million people have a form of asymptomaticRHD,
which can impact the cardiovascular system. It is estimated that there are 517,000 mortality
rates due to acute GAS each year (Carapetis et al., 2005, pp.658-694).Worldwide age-
standardized fatalities attributed to a decline in RheumaticHeartDisease by 47.8 percent from
1990 to 2015, but substantial variations were found across continents. Throughout 2015,
Oceania, South Asia and central sub-Saharan Africa saw the greatest age-standardized deaths
attributed to RHD(Watkins et al., 2017, pp. 713-722). There is also an increased rate of
incidences for ARF and RHD in different population groups of same countries,such as Māori
and non-Māori in New Zealand.Here the RHD mortality rates are indicated at 5-10 times
higher among Māori and Pacific population in compare to non-Māori and non-Pacific. The
prevalence rate of ARF is still high in New Zealand and has an effect particularlyon children
and young adults. It is shown that the recurrence of ARF is high among Māoricompared to

2
non-Māori people, which is also the case in the rates of RHD. This can be the result of some
inequalities such as household crowding and less access to healthcare which lead tomain side
effects and a shortening of life expectancy.The socioeconomic limitations such as education
and employment opportunities might increase the dependence on social assistance (Burgess,
H.M., 2016).
Task 2:
The biopsychosocial model is a scientific model which was established in 1997. According to
a philosophy of body-mind cohesion, it postulates that study must concentrate on better
understanding of a person and how a person is exposed to both internal and external factors,
such asbiological, psychological and social, that can affect the health and illness of the
person. The model is prominent and frequently cited in clinical contexts and health education,
and continues to be the basic structure for contemporary health care. The biopsychosocial
model offers a multidimensional context for health clinicians to optimize treatment and
understand differences in medical experiences by a process of conceptualizing patients and
explores a variety of causes through macro-and micro-level structures (Summer &Nicassio,
2016, pp. 3-20).
Bio-psycho-social models have proven helpful in addressing complex problems such chronic
disease and disorder function (Buckner, Heimberg, Ecker & Vinci, 2013). Importantly, bio-
psycho-social models require several variables to play a role and lead to treatment responses.
Therefore, these models have the ability to have greater predictive capacity than restrictive
models(Jensen, Adachi, Tomé-Pires, Lee, Osman & Miró, 2015, pp. 34-75).
Biological health factors include the genetic makeup of a person and evidence of physical
damage or infection.Genetics could be established as playing a valuable part in the
development of different diseases that are diagnosed in a person (Pilgrim, 2015, pp. 164-
180). For those with pre-existing genetic vulnerability,non-biological (i.e., environmental)
factors affect the presentation of the disease (Isvoranu et al., 2016, pp. 870-873). It is now
wellrecognized that influences such as physical, occupational and social factors affect the
development of severe health problems beyond the existence of genetic factors.
The biopsychosocial model's clinical dimension attempts to find a neurological cause for a
single disorder or series of symptoms (e.g. irritability, impulsivity, excessive depression,
etc.). Humans with genetic susceptibility can be more likely to show suicidal thoughts that