Essential Health Practices: Prevention, Treatment, and Advanced Therapies
Health
Health encompasses activities and services to promote, protect, and restore people’s well-being.
Water Treatment and Disinfection
Water supply requires treatment for drinking purposes:
- Pretreatment: Physical-chemical correction and removal of solid particles (filtration, decanting, or aeration).
- Disinfection: Elimination of pathogenic microorganisms using chlorine, ozone, or physical agents (ultraviolet radiation).
Waste Disposal
Wastewater needs preliminary purification to remove hazardous components. Solid waste must be collected and transported to treatment plants. Separate collection and recycling are essential to reduce waste and landfill or incineration is used for non-recyclable materials.
Food Safety
Consider the following:
- Lack of preservation techniques for perishable foods.
- Sanitary control to ensure the absence of parasites, microorganisms, and chemicals.
- Proper labeling and handling with strict hygienic measures.
The Immune System
The immune system defends the body against infectious agents and abnormal cells. Non-specific defenses (e.g., inflammation) act independently of the pathogen. Specific defenses recognize foreign substances (antigens) and trigger an immune response with specificity, memory, and tolerance.
Vaccines
A vaccine is an artificially prepared material from attenuated or dead organisms or their components, which stimulates the body’s immune response.
Diagnosis
Diagnosis identifies the cause of a health issue through various tests:
- Medical consultation
- Laboratory analysis
- Electrograms
- Anatomopathological exams
- Endoscopy
- Prenatal diagnosis
Medication Use
- Chemotherapy: Using chemical substances (drugs) to combat diseases.
- Disinfectants: Destroy microorganisms on objects.
- Antiseptics: Kill microorganisms on living tissues (alcohol, iodine, hydrogen peroxide).
- Antibiotics: Destroy or stop bacterial growth; bactericidal (beta-lactams, aminoglycosides) and bacteriostatic (erythromycin, tetracycline, chloramphenicol, sulfonamides).
- Antivirals, Anti-inflammatories, Analgesics, Corticosteroids, and other drugs.
Cancer Treatment
- Anticancer chemotherapy
- Immunotherapy
- Radiotherapy (external and internal, photodynamic)
Surgery
Surgery involves direct manipulation of the organism for diagnosis or anatomical repair. Arthroscopy and laparoscopy are minimally invasive endoscopic techniques for joints and the abdominal cavity, respectively. Catheterization accesses the heart through a small tube in an artery. Uterine surgery allows intervention on the fetus inside the womb.
Transplantation
Transplantation replaces damaged organs or tissues with donor material: autotransplant, isotransplant (genetically identical), allotransplant (genetically different), xenotransplant (different species). Rejection is an immune response against the transplanted cells.
Cell Therapy
Cell therapy treats diseases by implanting cultured cells (embryonic or adult stem cells). Applications include cardiovascular diseases, nervous system diseases, and autoimmune diseases.
Gene Therapy
Gene therapy inserts functional genes into cells with defective genes. In AIDS, gene therapy aims to destroy infected cells and protect uninfected cells by modifying CD4 molecules to avoid virus recognition.
Assisted Reproduction
Assisted reproduction helps infertile couples: artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization, intracytoplasmic sperm injection, and gamete intrafallopian transfer.
Preimplantation Diagnosis
Preimplantation diagnosis detects hereditary diseases or conditions affecting pre-embryo viability. Cryopreservation preserves embryos and biological material at -196 degrees.
Stages of Development and Clinical Trials
- Safety assessment at different dose levels.
- Screening for side effects.
- Focus on effectiveness.
- Post-market surveillance of effectiveness in different populations.
Generic Drugs
Generic drugs are equivalent to brand-name drugs whose patents have expired.
Natural and Alternative Therapies
Natural and alternative therapies aim to boost the body’s response to disease, rather than using drugs or surgery; examples include homeopathy and acupuncture.