Biology Assignment: Epidemiology and Prevention in Healthcare

This biology assignment delves into the concepts of epidemiology and prevention. It defines epidemiology as the study of disease origins and causes within populations, emphasizing the importance of prevention. The assignment discusses three stages of epidemiological prevention: primary, secondary, and tertiary. Primary prevention focuses on preventing disease in healthy individuals through lifestyle modifications like diet and exercise, with an example of smoking cessation for lung cancer. Secondary prevention involves early disease identification and symptom management, aiming to limit disease complications, also illustrated with lung cancer screening and smoking cessation. Tertiary prevention addresses disease consequences in affected patients, improving their quality of life through interventions like critical care and psychological support, using lung cancer as an example. The assignment references multiple studies to support its claims.

Running head: BIOLOGY ASSIGNMENT
EPIDEMIOLOGY AND PREVENTION
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author note

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As mentioned by Zheng, Ley and Hu (2018) epidemiology could be termed as the
study, which helps to identify the origin and causes of diseases affecting a wide range of
population. Prevention becomes one of the critical aspect in such condition as determining
the practices and aspects that could prevent outbreak of the disease could help to limit the
viability of patients towards the specific condition (Osetinsky et al., 2019). As mentioned by
Weisman et al. (2018), there are three stages of epidemiological prevention such as primary,
secondary and tertiary prevention method that helps to identify the complications and provide
the population with ways to avoid the complication.
Primary prevention
As per Moimaz et al. (2016), the primary prevention method is associated with the
identification and prevention of disease or disability in healthy individuals with
implementation of diet, eating preferences modifications, and implementation of physical
activities. The primary prevention deals with the reduction of risk to the population and
hence, preventive measures are associated with precautions such as vaccination and food and
diet habits (Bach et al., 2017). In case of lung cancer, the primary prevention includes
cessation of smoking as well as avoiding passive smoking so that the environmental tobacco
smoke related complications could be prevented (New & Keith, 2018). Hence, through this,
the risk of lung cancer could be reduced.
Secondary prevention
Whereas, in secondary prevention, it is all about identification of disease with
categorization of symptoms, prevention of worse disease condition and limiting the disease
complication for the patients (Osetinsky et al., 2019). This prevention stage is associated with
reduction of disease complication for the patients both symptomatic and asymptomatic. This
prevention stage is associated with identification with the help of diagnosis processes so that

2BIOLOGY ASSIGNMENT
accuracy of the treatment could be maintained (Weisman et al., 2018). In case of lung cancer,
the secondary prevention would also categorize the symptoms and smoking cessation still
plays an important role as Fujiki et al. (2018) mentioned that prevention of it could reduce the
chances of acquiring toxic material in the patient’s body. Further, for the identification and
diagnosis of the disease, the patient would be screened through processes so that
categorization of the complication could be analyzed (Schüz, Espina & Wild, 20-19).
Tertiary prevention
The third prevention type in epidemiology is associated with reduction of the disease
consequences or complication as the disease has already affected the patient. Hence, it helps
in the reduction of the complication of critical health condition (Moimaz et al., 2016). With
application of critical, and lifesaving drugs, it helps to increase or uplift the quality of life for
the patients that are terminally or critically ill (Bach et al., 2017). Therefore, these are types
of the preventions in epidemiology of healthcare. The tertiary prevention in lung cancer is
associated with understanding the psychological aspects of this disease and its effects so that
the patient’s quality of life could be improved (New & Keith, 2018). Further, reduction of
disability and morbidity would be another aspect that would be used in the tertiary prevention
in epidemiology of disease prevention.

3BIOLOGY ASSIGNMENT
References
Bach, M., Jordan, S., Hartung, S., Santos-Hövener, C., & Wright, M. T. (2017). Participatory
epidemiology: the contribution of participatory research to epidemiology. Emerging
themes in epidemiology, 14(1), 2.
Fujiki, H., Watanabe, T., Sueoka, E., Rawangkan, A., & Suganuma, M. (2018). Cancer
prevention with green tea and its principal constituent, EGCG: From early
investigations to current focus on human cancer stem cells. Molecules and
cells, 41(2), 73.
Moimaz, S. A., Borges, H. C., Saliba, O., Garbin, C. A., & Saliba, N. A. (2016). Early
childhood caries: epidemiology, severity and sociobehavioural determinants. Oral
Health Prev Dent, 14(1), 77-83.
New, M., & Keith, R. (2018). Early detection and chemoprevention of lung
cancer. F1000Research, 7.
Osetinsky, B., Hontelez, J. A., Lurie, M. N., McGarvey, S. T., Bloomfield, G. S., Pastakia, S.
D., ... & Galárraga, O. (2019). Epidemiological And Health Systems Implications Of
Evolving HIV And Hypertension In South Africa And Kenya. Health Affairs, 38(7),
1173-1181.
Schüz, J., Espina, C., & Wild, C. P. (2019). Primary prevention: a need for concerted
action. Molecular oncology, 13(3), 567-578.
Weisman, A., Fazli, G. S., Johns, A., & Booth, G. L. (2018). Evolving trends in the
epidemiology, risk factors, and prevention of type 2 diabetes: A review. Canadian
Journal of Cardiology, 34(5), 552-564.

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Zheng, Y., Ley, S. H., & Hu, F. B. (2018). Global aetiology and epidemiology of type 2
diabetes mellitus and its complications. Nature Reviews Endocrinology, 14(2), 88.