CONCEPT OF DISEASE

Dr.Abdifatah Ahmed Abdullahi

 Concept of Disease
• “A condition in which body function is impaired, departure from
a state of health, an alteration of the human body interrupting the
performance of the vital functions.” - Webster.
• Oxford English Dictionary – the condition of body or some part
of organ of body in which its functions are disrupted or deranged.
• Ecologically – ‘a maladjustment of human organism to the
environment’
• Simplest definition – ‘opposite to Health’.
HEALTH AND ILLNESS
The Health-Sickness spectrum
 Historical Theories for
causation of disease
• “Supernatural causes
• Theory of humors (humor means fluid)
• The miasmatic theory of disease
• Theory of contagion
• Germ theory
• Epidemiological Triad
• Multi-factorial causation
• Web of causation
………Supernatural to multi-factorial causes…
 Environment

Host Agent
 Epidemiological triad
Agent Factors
Physical Agents
Chemical Agents
Biological Agents
Nutritional agents

Environmental Factors
Physical Environment
Biological Environment
Social Environment
Host Factors
Socio-demographic Factors
Psycho-social Factors
Intrinsic Characteristics
Natural History of Disease
Spectrum of disease
 Disease Forms..

• Acute
• Chronic/insidious
• Carrier
 Subclinical Case:
ICEBERG PHENONMENON

Example: Cholera , Polio, hypertension, malnutrition etc.

 Some terms..
• Disease- biological concept.
Means physiological/psychological dysfunction

• Illness –socio-pathological concept.

Means - subjective feeling of not being well.

• Sickness – Biological concept of social dysfunction.

Thank you