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Consumer Behaviour Analysis

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Consumer Behaviour Analysis

Diagnosing and treating a particular health condition is an important practice in the

healthcare setting. Nurses and other healthcare professionals are tasked with identify relevant

nursing diagnoses by analyzing and clustering patient information based on the symptoms.

According to Turabian (2019), nursing diagnosis refers to a clinical judgment based on the

human response to a particular health process or condition. Diagnosing a patient means

examining all the vulnerabilities to their health and developing an appropriate treatment strategy

to improve their health outcome in the healthcare setting. To identify a medical condition of a

patient, nurses prioritize their diagnosis procedures, examine the root problems of the condition,

and create an issue-based plan used to meet the health needs of a patient. This is the same

procedure applied in the case of Tom, a construction field worker who shows signs and

symptoms of a disease that can be easily identified in a clinical setting.

From the case study, it is clear that Tom's diagnosis is tetanus. I concluded this way

because the most prevalent symptoms of tetanus in adults are pain in the jaws and stiffness in the

body parts and soaring throats. Most importantly, Tom has a lockjaw, which is synonymous with

tetanus. According to Nakajima et al (2018), tetanus bacteria grows in puncture wounds on the

body which are caused by insect bites, nails, and blunt objects. Contaminated wounds are major

storage areas where tetanus bacteria grow and multiply. In this case, Tom forgot about the

wound that was caused by a large metal rod, which created a chance for the entry of tetanus

bacteria. When tetanus bacteria enter the body, they affect the working mechanism between the

muscles and the nerve system. When the tetanus bacteria come into contact with these body

parts, it leads to damage of the neuromuscular junction which amplifies the chemical signal that

causes tightening of muscles (Nakajima et al, 2018). This is what Weant et al (2021) call
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"muscle spasms" which lead to the inability to nurse the injury especially when sanitation of the

affected area is poor. The resultant effects of muscle spasms include irritability, restlessness, and

lockjaws. Restlessness is the most common symptom because many body muscles are affected

by the tetanus bacteria which affect the normal breathing system in human beings. For example,

Nakajima et al (2018) reveal that when important breathing muscles lose their power due to the

effect of tetanus bacteria, it becomes hard to breathe and in worse situations, it can lead to death.

All these symptoms are present in the case study. For example, Tom shows signs of restlessness,

stiffness in major parts of the body like the neck, and challenges in opening jaws due to the

damage caused by the tetanus bacteria on the body muscles.

From the examination of tetanus disease, the main vaccine for its treatment is tetanus

toxoid. This means that Tom was given tetanus toxin as an antitoxin. Tetanus Toxoid gives a

passive immunity because it contains previously performed antibodies, which means it is not a

primary anti-toxin that can warrantee it to give active immunity. According to Ticha et al

(2021), tetanus antitoxin is mixed with some quantity of TIGH to give a patient a low-level

passive immunity that is responsible for initiating active immunization. Besides, tetanus toxoid is

only applicable to people more than 7 years and above. The tetanus toxoid anti-toxicant is

injected subcutaneously or intramuscularly in the affected area because the tetanus bacteria

mostly affect the muscle system in the body. Again, there is sufficient evidence from the case

study that tetanus toxoid is the anti-toxin that was administered to Tom. For example, after

visiting the doctor, the affected part was thoroughly cleansed. Ticha et al (2021) reveal that

injecting the tetanus toxoid requires cleansing of the affected area using a relevant germicide.

Therefore, the aforementioned arguments explain why tetanus toxoid is the antitoxin that was

given to Tom.
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Immunity refers to the ability of the body to protect itself from infectious and harmful

diseases (Flajnik, 2018). There are two major categories of immunity; adaptive and innate where

adaptive immunity is the third line of defense in the body while innate immunity is inherent since

the birth of a person (Flajnik, 2018). Active and passive immunity fall under adaptive immunity

because both of them are forms of acquired immunity that protects an individual from a

particular pathogen. Active immunity is a type of immunity where the body actively produces

antibodies and the development of memory cells to protect a person from an external or foreign

pathogen (Flajnik, 2018). On the other hand, passive immunity is a type of immunity that results

from the introduction of antibodies from an external source to protect an individual from a

particular pathogen (Flajnik, 2018). In its entirety, active immunity produces long-term

protection to an individual while passive immunity is short-term because it does not produce

memory cells. Active and passive immunity is categorized into two classifications; natural and

artificial immunity. Natural active immunity refers to the production of antibodies in response to

a particular pathogen (Flajnik, 2018). For example, a person infected with chickenpox will

produce antibodies that can protect an individual for a long time. Artificial active immunity

refers to the production of antibodies in response to a particular controlled exposure to a certain

attenuated pathogen (Flajnik, 2018). For example, children are vaccinated against polio to create

antibodies that protect them from polio-related effects. On the other hand, natural passive

immunity refers to receiving antibodies from other people or organisms like in the case of a

mother passing antibodies to the baby through breastfeeding (Flajnik, 2018). Artificial passive

immunity passes manufactured antibodies to an individual via external delivery such as

transfusion of blood that contains monoclonal antibodies into an individual.

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According to Kittai et al (2017), organs are rejected by the body because of the response

from the immune system to a foreign organ. The immune system is responsible for protecting the

body from external or foreign elements. The entry of a foreign organ into the body triggers the

immune system to destroy it because such an organ conflicts with the normal functioning of the

human body. According to Kittai et al (2017), the immune system is responsible for mediating

cells in the body which deny any form of interaction with foreign organs. The immune system

protects the body from the entry of harmful substances like cancer cells, poisons, germs, and

foreign organs. Foreign organs enter the body in form of antigens which trigger a negative

response from the immune system because they are automatically labeled "foreign" by the entire

body system Kittai et al (2017). Therefore, when people receive organs from other people

through transplant surgery, the immune system responds to it as foreign. The mismatch of organ

systems in the recipients’ body system leads to organ rejection.

A graft refers to transplanting tissue or an organ from one person or animal to another in

a particular body part (Eljazwi, 2020). The main goal of grafting is to replace or repair an injured

or damaged tissue or organ of the body. Since transplantation involves transferring of an organ or

tissue without their initial circulatory system, they vary in the way they interact and connect with

other new tissues. This is why there are different types of grafts based on the source. For

example, allografts are grafts that are transplanted from a genetically distinct person to another

genetically distinct person because they belong to the same species group (Eljazwi, 2020). There

is another type of graft called isograft where transplant tissues or organs are removed from the

monozygotic twin and transferred to another monozygotic twin (Eljazwi, 2020). Autograft is a

type of graft where one part of an individual’s body is removed to treat a damaged part of the

same body, like a skin graft applied on a burnt body part of the patient (Eljazwi, 2020). Lastly,
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xenograft is a type of graft where a transplanted tissue or organ is removed from an animal to

treat a human body part (Eljazwi, 2020).

Elsewhere, the chimeric immune system refers to the type of immune where immune

stem cells from the recipient are mixed with those of the donor (June & Sadelain, 2018). This

type of immune ensures that the immunity of stem cells of the recipient of an organ transplant

and that of the donor remains strong and also prevents the body from rejecting organs.

Lastly, there are various ways in which the virus spreads in the body. For example, when

the flu virus attacks cells, it attaches its DNA to that of the host, making it multiply in the

process. When multiplication ceases, the virus' DNA produces several viral proteins through

transcription, leading to a continuous flow of viral particles that affect other cells (June &

Sadelain, 2018). However, this spread is prevented to attack the normal cells through interferons

which are responsible for signaling neighboring cells of the impending viral attack.
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References

Eljazwi, F. (2020). Transplant

Flajnik, M. F. (2018). A cold-blooded view of adaptive immunity. Nature Reviews

Immunology, 18(7), 438-453.

June, C. H., & Sadelain, M. (2018). Chimeric antigen receptor therapy. New England Journal of

Medicine, 379(1), 64-73.

Kittai, A. S., Oldham, H., Cetnar, J., & Taylor, M. (2017). Immune checkpoint inhibitors in

organ transplant patients. Journal of Immunotherapy, 40(7), 277-281.

Nakajima, M., Aso, S., Matsui, H., Fushimi, K., & Yasunaga, H. (2018). Clinical features and

outcomes of tetanus: analysis using a National Inpatient Database in Japan. Journal of

critical care, 44, 388-391.

Ticha, O., Klemm, D., Moos, L., & Bekeredjian-Ding, I. (2021). A cell-based in vitro assay for

testing of immunological integrity of Tetanus toxoid vaccine antigen. npj Vaccines, 6(1),

1-11.

Turabian, J. L. (2019). Doctor-Patient Relationship in General Medicine Has a Diagnostic

Meaning. International Research in Medical and Health Sciences, 2(5), 20-27.

Weant, K. A., Fields, B., Guerin, C. S., & Justice, S. B. (2021). Don't Be a Stiff: A Review

Article on the Management of Tetanus. Advanced Emergency Nursing Journal, 43(1), 10-

20.