Paper Example on Mycobacterium Tuberculosis

Introduction

On March 24, 1882, Dr. Robert Koch, a German surgeon, and inventor, revealed the Mycobacterium tuberculosis, a bacterium that causes tuberculosis. TB exterminated one out of seven individuals living in the United States and Europe, during this time. In ancient Hebrew tuberculosis was called Schachebeth, in Early Rome, it was known as Tabes, and in Greece Phthisis. In the 1700s, TB was termed the "white plague" because the patients experienced paleness in their bodies. Dr. Koch's innovation was a significant step taken towards managing and eradication of the fatal infection.

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Route of Transmission

Equally important, Mycobacterium tuberculosis is carried in airborne elements, named droplets nuclei, of 1-5 microns in diameter. Persons who suffer from pulmonary or laryngeal TB sickness produce transmissible droplet nuclei when they shout, sneeze, cough, or sing. The little atoms can stay up in the air for many hours, depending on the atmosphere. The diffusion develops when an individual breathes in droplet nuclei comprising M. tuberculosis, and the droplet nuclei pass through the adenoidal track, then to the upper respiratory tract, and bronchi to spread the alveoli of the lungs. The young children with TB are less contagious because the children do not produce sputum when they cough as compared to adults. Moreover, the methods applied to assess the infectiousness of TB in the adults should be used for the children and adolescents as well. Coughing persisting for more than three weeks, or the respiratory tract syndrome with the involvement of airwaves, and the lungs indicates the presence of tuberculosis (CDC, 2010).

Risk Factors

Further, the leading contributing factor of TB epidemiology involves rapid urbanization, extreme levels of populace movement, and global socioeconomic disparities. These circumstances give rise to insufficient allocations of the community determinants of TB. The social factors include deprived housing and environmental situations, the financial, topographical, and ethnic hurdle to health care access, and food insecurity and malnourishment.

Epidemiological Determinants

The distribution of the social determining factors influences the four phases of TB pathogenesis, which entail disclosure to contamination, development of the disease, and delayed analysis and cure. Furthermore, congestion in the home environment, workstations, and community hubs upsurges the possibility of the uninfected individuals being subjected to TB contagion, which makes the societal determinants the key risk aspects for TB. The vulnerability to infection can be intensified by poverty, starvation, illness, and severity of the clinical outcomes (Hargreaves et al., 2011).

How the Outbreak can Affect the Community

Equally important, TB is frequently connected with features that generate stigma within the community, for instance, drugs and alcohol abuse, poverty, homelessness, and HIV. People with TB are victimized mostly in the small societies, and even families turn away from the individuals infected with TB. For this reason, the individuals with TB indications can be reluctant in seeking medical attention for fear of discrimination; therefore, making the patient ill and the possibility of infecting others advances. Moreover, due to the isolation, you will find students performing poorly in school, some kids will drop out of schools, and cases of suicide will increase because of stigmatization. There will be the high prevalence of TB leading to incompetence in our businesses and more so can affect the entire economy of the nation (TB Alert, 2018).

Reporting Protocol

Reporting protocols for Persons with TB illness specify that they should obtain social learning about TB and the medical facilities that involve curing without consideration for their capability to pay. The health sector is lawfully accountable in guaranteeing that the entire investigations regarding the TB occurrences reported in its jurisdiction are complete. Moreover, the TB regulating agendas should make sure that the person confirmed with the TB infection have all set admission to analytic medication and facilities that meet their criteria. These services are offered by the local sponsored TB professionals and the state and are supervised by the health department. However, persons also obtain medical care for tuberculosis in the private hospitals. The medical amenities should offer screening, monitory tests, and diagnosis to their clients. The TB control curriculums should provide training in both the clinical and public health aspects of TB to all their staff. The TB agendas should educate the community health officers, public members, and policymakers, centered on the local epidemiology and needs of the prevention and control of TB (CDC, 2005).

Prevention Strategies

Besides, the patient education strategy: entails educating the patients about the TB sickness to certify efficient conclusion of treatment. In this approach, the healthcare workers take adequate time to expound plainly to the patients on what medicine should be taken, how often, how much and when. The persons infected with tuberculosis are informed on when to go for necessary medical treatment and the likely opposing response to the medicine they are using. Furthermore, the patients are impacted by the knowledge they require regarding the effects of not taking their medication appropriately. Of equal importance, the community education strategy is vital and is mainly used in those surroundings where high treatment proportions are already attained. The public training in the basic of TB epidemiology can help in developing the case definitions, stimulate the devotion to medication, and lessen diagnosis delay. The community campaigns programs for tuberculosis assist in reducing the levels of preconception against the TB patients. Raising the awareness through community education has improved the mandate for direct slurs in the number of current cases of communicable practices of TB (Jaramillo, 2001).

Conclusion

To sum up, tuberculosis is a communicable disease that affects both children and adults. A person can generate infectious droplet nuclei by coughing, shouting, and sneezing. Both community and patient education strategies are significant in eliminating the scourge of TB. The social determiners influence the infection of TB, to progression, and late diagnosis, TB is preventable and can be cured when detected early.

References

CDC. (2005). Chapter 8: Community Tuberculosis Control. Retrieved from https://www.cdc.gov/tb/education/corecurr/pdf/chapter8.pdf.Chapter 2 Transmission and Pathogenesis of Tuberculosis. (2010). Retrieved from https://www.cde.gov/tb/education/covecurr/pgfchapter 2.pdf.Jaramillo, E. (2001). The Impact of Media-based Health Education on Tuberculosis diagnosis in Cal Columbia. Vol. 16(1) p. 68-73. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.599.2845&rep1&type=pdf.

Hargreaves, J., Boccia, D., Evans, C., Adato, M., Petticrew, M., Porter, J. (2011). The Social Determiners of Tuberculosis: From evidence to action, Promoting Public Health Research Policy Practice Education, 101(4) p. 654-662. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3052350

TB Alert. (2018). For Future without Tuberculosis. Retrieved from https://www.tbalert.org/about-tb/global=tb-challenge/stigma-myths/