Home | | Medicine Study Notes | Communicable Disease Control

Chapter: Medicine Study Notes : Public Health

Communicable Disease Control

Reasons for notification: o High morbidity and mortality (in epidemiology terms, ie deaths per 100,000 of well population). o Intervention available

Communicable Disease Control



·        Reasons for notification:

o   High morbidity and mortality (in epidemiology terms, ie deaths per 100,000 of well population).

o   Intervention available

o   Other:

§  High public interest.  Eg CJD – is both rare and untreatable

§  Historical.  Eg decompression sickness


·        Notifiable Diseases:

o  Under Health Act 1956

§  Section A: infectious diseases notifiable to a medical officer of Health and Local Authority 

§  [involve water or food transmission]: acute gastro-enteritis (where common source or person in high risk occupation), cholera, giardiasis, legionellosis, primary amoebic meningoencephalitis, shigellosis, yersiniosis, campylobacteriosis, cryptosporidiosis, Hepatitis A, Listeriosis, salmonellosis, typhoid and paratyphoid fever 

§  Section B: infectious diseases notifiable to Medical Officer of Health: AIDS, CJD, HIB, Hepatitis C, Hydatid disease, Leptospirosis, measles, Neisseria meningitidis, plague, rabies, rickettsial diseases, tetanus, yellow fever, anthrax, brucellosis, diphtheria, Hepatitis B, Leprosy, malaria, mumps, pertussis, poliomyelitis, rheumatic fever, rubella 

§  Notifiable non-infectious diseases: cysticercosis, taeniasis, trichinosis, decompression sickness, lead poisoning, poisoning from contamination of the environment

o  All forms of TB (under TB Act 1948)

o  Venereal Diseases Act (1986?): covers gonorrhoea and syphilis, and contract tracing


·        Classification of notifiable diseases:

§  Vaccine preventable diseases

§  Blood borne and sexually transmitted diseases

§  Food and water borne diseases

§  Vector borne eg Malaria

§  Zoonoses (ie animal stage) eg Brucellosis, Hydatids, Rabies

§  Other Infectious diseases: eg CJD, Hepatitis, Leprosy, TB 

§  Non-infectious diseases: Decompression illness, Lead poisoning, environmental contamination


·        Process of notification: 

o  Is a legal requirement, although compliance is poor with common things like campylobacter. Only a small proportion contact doctor, only a few of these tested, only a few of these reported, etc

o  When to notify:

§  If serious on suspicion (eg meningitis)

§  If not serious (eg gastroenteritis) then on confirmation


·        Possible interventions:

o  Food borne – isolate source and close it down 

o  If AIDS and spread by blood products ® screen blood

o  If AIDS and confined to a locality ® education campaign


·        Surveillance system:

o  Report to medical officer of health 

o  Clinical labs also report to medical officer of health (if a special case then refer sample to the CDC Reference Lab – ESR). 

o  These all report to the CDC Epidemiology Group (also at Porirua), produce the Public Health Report 

o  In turn report to the Ministry of Health and MAF, so they can form surveillance and disease control policy (eg vaccination and screening policy, promotion, etc)

o  Other surveillance systems: coroner, Births, Deaths and Marriage, OSH, Cancer Registry


·        Epidemics:

o  An outbreak or epidemic is relative, is „more than you would expect‟ 

o  An outbreak investigation involves analysis of the time over which illnesses have occurred, the places and the characteristics of the people affected

o  Patterns of epidemic:

§  Point source out-break (eg food poisoning) – short duration 

§  Multiple source out-break: eg measles, index case spreads to multiple cases – long duration with fluctuating incidence

o  Want to find:

§  Agent

§  Vector

§  Source 

§  Can affect rate without known the agent. Eg cholera was controlled through clean water in London before the bug was discovered


Study Material, Lecturing Notes, Assignment, Reference, Wiki description explanation, brief detail
Medicine Study Notes : Public Health : Communicable Disease Control |


Privacy Policy, Terms and Conditions, DMCA Policy and Compliant

Copyright © 2018-2024 BrainKart.com; All Rights Reserved. Developed by Therithal info, Chennai.