The Prevention Concept Analysis

Prevention consists of the measures that are implemented to prevent occurrence of a disease or a condition and are directed towards eliminating or minimizing the impact of disease and disability. Prevention, being an emerging concept, calls for a lot of attention because the health of any individual is determinant of any other activity they carry out. It is, therefore, important to evaluate the concepts of prevention as used in the nursing profession.

Significance of concept

Prevention started ages ago and even proverbial sayings show its importance in the saying, “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound.” Prevention is of great importance and is evident in vaccines saving millions of people from death each year. In psychiatric/mental health nursing, it aims at preventing a condition rather than treating the condition to save on cost. Prevention helps in avoiding conditions that would lead to permanent disabilities if by chance they would occur. Most mental conditions on occurrence are irreversible. Statistics show that countries that put great emphasis on disease prevention have low mortality rates as compared to those who put more emphasis on curing disease.

Concept definition and literature review

During the past years, interest in health care promotion has increased which has been due to several factors. The major factor has been the shift from infectious diseases to chronic diseases that has been named as world killers. This shift is commonly referred to as epidemiologic transition characterized by low birthrates, ageing population and increased cost of health care (Kessler et al, 2013). Previously, disease identification was easy but with changing times and the emergence of many diseases, characteristics of diseases hav...

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...people and the communities that surround us.

References

Cappelli, D. P., & Mobley, C. C. (2008). Prevention in clinical oral health care. St. Louis, Mo: Mosby Elsevier.

Wiesel, E. (2004). Disease prevention through immunization: Beginning of health care reform. S.l.: Diane Pub Co.

Rubin, I. L., & Crocker, A. C. (2006). Medical care for children & adults with developmental disabilities. Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes Pub.

Kessler et al. (2013). The Epidemiology of co‐occurring addictive and mental disorders: implications for prevention and service utilization. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 66(1), p. 17-31.

Russell, L. B. (2009). Preventing chronic disease: an important investment, but don’t count on cost savings. Health Affairs, 28(1), p. 42-45.

Showstacket al. (1996). Health of the public: the private-sector challenge. JAMA, 276(13), p. 1071-1074.