Quick public health Flashcards
What are the 4 general categories of health influences?
Biological, personal lifestyle, health services, the physical and social environment.
What did the black report confirm?
Social class health inequalities in overall mortality Health inequalities are widening
What mechanisms did the black report use to explain the social class health inequalities?
Social selection, behaviour and material circumstance
What did the Acheson report in 1988 state?
Mortality has decreased in the last 50 years but inequalities remained or have widened/
What did the Acheson report recommend?
Evaluate policies likely to affect in terms of impact on inequality
Prioritise the health of families and children
Reduce income inequality and improve living conditions in poor households
What are the life course theories as to how health inequality is caused?
Critical periods have a greater impact i.e. measles in pregnancy
Hard blue-collar work, the hazards and their impacts add up
Interactions and pathways.
What are the psychosocial theories as to how health inequality is caused?
Social inequality may affect how people feel which inturn can affect body chemistry
What are the materialist theories as to how health inequality is caused?
Poverty exposes people to more health hazards.
Disadvantaged people are more likely to live in areas exposed to harm
What must consent be?
Voluntary, informed, made by someone with capacity
What must you tell people before they consent to something?
What, how, risks, benefits, alternatives
When does a patient become unable to make a decision?
Understand the relevant info
Retain it
Use or weight it to make a decision
Communicate the decision
What would you do if the patient couldn’t make the decision?
Check if someone else can make the decision for them.,
act in the patients best interests respecting their beliefs and values, past decisions made.
What are the CHD prone behaviours?
Competitive, hostile, impatient
Type A behaviour
What are the Whitehall studies?
They examined the mortality rates over 10 years among male British civil servants aged 20-64
What were the outcomes of the Whitehall studies?
Mortality was higher amongst those in the lower grades compared to those in higher grade jobs.
What can doctors do to try and overcome social inequalities?
Ask about occupation in history
Ask patients about available support
Identify signs of depression and anxiety.
Absolutist investigations of difference in mortality due to CHD>
Its abut poverty, absolute measures of socioeconomic deprivation.
What are the criteria for verifying someone’s death?
No heart sounds or carotid pulse for 1 minute
No breath sounds or respiratory effort for 1 minute
No response to painful stimuli
Pupils are fixed and dilated.
What is the definition of palliative care?
Improves the QOL of patients and families who face life threatening illness.
Provides pain and symptom relief.
How to work out the number of units of alcohol in a drink?
(%ABV x volume in ml)/ 1000
How many units of alcohol should you not exceed per week?
14 units
What is substance misuse?
Results in failure to fulfil roe obligations e.g. work, school, home life
May be physically hazardous
Continued misuse despite persistent or recurrent social or interpersonal problems.
What is dependance?
A state in which an organism functions normally only in the presence of a drug
Manifests as a physical disturbance when the drug is withdrawn
What is tolerance?
A state in which an organism no longer responds to a drug
A higher dose is required to achieve the same effect
