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Questions and Answers
What is the purpose of the hazard exposure outcome model?
How is risk defined according to the framework presented?
Which of the following best describes ionizing radiation?
What does the term LD50 refer to in risk assessments?
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Which type of radiation can cause thermal damage to humans?
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What is defined as the amount of a contaminant that gets biologically available in the body?
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Which type of dose-response curve represents the relationship between exposure and the probability of an event occurring?
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What is the practice of introducing small amounts of a stressor or toxin for potential health benefits called?
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What is a critical threshold in the context of the threshold effect?
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What does the dose-response relationship describe?
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Which of the following best describes epigenetics?
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What does the socio-economic environment influence?
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Which of the following measures does NOT directly assess health?
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What is the definition of illness?
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What do the Sustainable Development Goals aim to achieve by 2030?
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Which of the following statements about Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs) is correct?
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Which factor is part of a person's personal environment that affects health?
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Which of the following does NOT fall under the category of external environment?
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What type of hazards are related to slippery floors and poorly maintained equipment?
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What best describes background radiation?
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Which group of people experienced increased incidences of leukemia and cataracts due to radiation exposure at Chernobyl?
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How does exposure concentration relate to health risk?
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Why are children especially vulnerable to iodine-131 released into the environment?
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Which type of biological agents can potentially cause harm if contacted or ingested?
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What can be a consequence of institutional hazards on a person's health?
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What is meant by the term 'infection intensity'?
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What is a characteristic of a human reservoir in disease transmission?
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Which of the following is an example of a zoonotic disease?
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What does the portal of exit refer to in the chain of transmission?
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Which mode of transmission includes both human contact and environmental contact?
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In which stage does the infectious agent grow and multiply?
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What distinguishes tetanus from other vaccine-preventable diseases?
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Which example illustrates droplet spread in disease transmission?
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What type of reservoir does soil represent in disease transmission?
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Study Notes
Environmental Factors Affecting Health
- Personal Environment: Includes individual characteristics and behaviors that impact health, such as diet, exercise, lifestyle choices, and genetics.
- External Environment: Encompasses physical surroundings such as clean water, air pollution, working conditions, and housing quality.
- Socio-Economic Environment: Involves institutional systems that influence resources, money, and health, including welfare states and universal healthcare access.
Epigenetics
- Studies how environmental factors and behaviors affect gene expression without altering the underlying DNA sequence.
- These epigenetic changes are reversible and can impact how the body uses genetic information.
Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
- A set of 17 interconnected goals established by the United Nations to address global challenges such as poverty, environmental protection, and peace.
- All UN member states have adopted these goals, which include specific targets to measure progress.
Health Definitions and Measures
- Disease: Any deviation from normal bodily structure or function, leading to reduced efficiency.
- Illness: A personal experience of feeling unwell, subjective and individual to the person.
- Health: A state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being, not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.
- Health Measures: Include assessments of bodily structure and function, presence or absence of disease, symptoms, abilities, and limitations. Common measures include morbidity, mortality, self-rated health, life satisfaction, happiness, sense of belonging, life expectancy, disability-adjusted life years (DALYs), and perceived quality of life.
Disability-Adjusted Life Years (DALYs)
- One DALY represents the loss of one year of healthy life.
- MPOX (Monkeypox) is becoming more prevalent in Africa.
Hazards, Exposure, and Outcomes
- Hazard Exposure Outcome Model: A framework for risk assessment, which considers the possibility of harm from hazards.
- Hazard: Something with the potential to cause harm to health and well-being.
- Risk: The likelihood or probability that harm from a specific hazard will occur, calculated as Hazard x Exposure.
Types of Hazards
Physical Hazards
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Chemical Hazards: Substances that cause direct harm to human tissue, including:
- Legal Dose Thresholds: Quantify the amount of a substance that can be ingested without causing harm.
- LD50: The dose of a substance that is lethal to 50% of a group of test animals, indicating acute toxicity.
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Radiation Hazards:
- Ionizing Radiation: Radiation with enough energy to remove electrons from atoms, potentially damaging DNA (e.g., X-rays, radioactive decay).
- Non-Ionizing Radiation: Radiation that does not have enough energy to remove electrons, but can cause thermal damage (e.g., UV radiation).
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UV Radiation: A form of non-ionizing radiation emitted by the sun and artificial sources (e.g., tanning beds).
Mechanical Hazards
- Excessive energy transmitted to tissues that exceed their ability to resist harm.
- Occupational Hazards: Slippery floors, falls, poorly maintained equipment, loud noises, and unguarded walkways.
- Community Hazards: Sports injuries, motor vehicle accidents, and fall injuries.
Biological Hazards
- Viruses, bacteria, prions, fungi, or parasites that can cause harm through inhalation, ingestion, or skin contact.
- Infection Intensity: The number of microorganisms in an infected host.
- Evidence of Infection: Detection of genetic material, antibodies, and antigens.
Social Hazards
- Institutional factors that limit access to health services, water, food, transportation, or increase the risk of health complications.
Exposure
- Exposure: The combination of concentration and route of exposure to a hazard.
- Exposure Concentration: The quantity and duration of contact with a hazard.
- Background Radiation: Constant exposure to ionizing radiation from sources such as cosmic radiation.
- Cosmic Radiation: High-energy particles, X-rays, and gamma rays produced in space.
Chernobyl Health Impact
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Workers:
- 600 workers onsite, 134 suffered acute radiation syndrome (ARS), and 28 died within 3 months.
- Increased leukemia and cataracts reported among workers exposed to higher radiation doses.
- 530,000 recovery operation workers exposed to 20 - 500 mSv (average 120 mSv) of radiation between 1986 and 1990.
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Public: Exposure to radioactive iodine-131, particularly affecting children's thyroid glands.
Dose and Dose-Response
- Dose: The amount of a contaminant that enters the body in a biologically available form.
- Dose-Response Relationship: Links the dose of exposure to the effects on individuals or populations.
- Continuous Graded Dose-Response Curve: Shows how the severity of a response changes with increasing doses (e.g., drug effects).
- Quantal Dose-Response Curve: Represents the probability of an outcome (e.g., disease or death) at different doses.
- Hormesis: The concept that some stress or toxicity in small amounts can be beneficial (e.g., radiation therapy for cancer).
- Threshold Effect: An outcome occurs only after a specific critical threshold of exposure is reached.
Chain of Transmission
- Describes how infections spread through a series of stages:
- Infectious Agent (Pathogen): The causative organism.
- Reservoir: The habitat where the pathogen lives, grows, and multiplies.
- Portal of Exit: How the agent leaves the reservoir.
- Mode of Transmission: How the agent travels to a susceptible host.
- Portal of Entry: How the agent enters the new host.
- Susceptible Host: An individual vulnerable to infection.
Reservoirs
- Human Reservoir: Humans who carry and transmit infectious agents.
- Animal Reservoir: Animals that host pathogens (e.g., rabies, avian and swine flu, plague).
- Environmental Reservoir: Elements of the environment that harbor pathogens (e.g., soil, water).
Portals of Exit
- How an infectious agent leaves its reservoir (e.g., mouth, skin cuts, stool).
Modes of Transmission
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Direct Contact:
- Human Contact: Transmission through physical contact, kissing, or sexual intercourse.
- Environmental Contact: Transmission through contact with contaminated soil or vegetation.
- Droplet Spread: Short-range transmission through aerosolized particles from sneezing, coughing, or talking.
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Description
Explore the connections between personal, external, and socio-economic environmental factors and their effects on health. Additionally, delve into epigenetics and the role of sustainable development goals in health outcomes. Test your knowledge on how these elements interrelate within our global society.