Epidemiology in the Elderly with Heart Disease
Public health promotes healthy living for each community through epidemiology. Disease prevention and control is the common goal of epidemiology, nursing practice, and public health. “Epidemiology is the study of the population in order to monitor the health of the population, understand the determinants of health and disease in the community, and investigate and evaluate interventions to prevent disease and maintain health” (Stanhope & Lancaster. 2008). Epidemiologists have developed many parameters to slow the spread of disease. For example, cardiovascular disease including hypertension, coronary heart disease, and rhythmic disorders have become increasingly common with advancing age across the country. Epidemiology is the study of health related events, characteristics, and determinant patterns in a population. Public health researchers use epidemiology to help make policies and identifying risk factors for disease and preventable medicine through evidence based studies. Epidemiology looks at diseases such as cardiovascular disease along with infectious diseases such as influenza. Epidemiologists take into account health behaviors such as diet and activity, social conditions such as poverty and housing, health services and research. Epidemiology can be either descriptive or analytical. Descriptive epidemiology is the study of the distribution of health-related states or events. It refers to the occurrence of disease, in term of person, place, and time (Stanhope & Lancaster 2008). It rules out chance, bias, confounding as explanations of observed differences, and draws conclusions as causal hypotheses. It also includes public health surveillance. Analytic epidemiology studies the determinants of health related states or events. It measures and tests the causes and associations (the how and why), from descriptive studies hypotheses,
References: (1999). Relation Between Myocardial Infarction, Depression, Hostility, and Death. Keller, K., & Lemberg, L. (2006). Secondary prevention of coronary artery disease in elderly persons: a treatise on a report by the American Heart Association Stanhope, M. Lancaster, J. (2008). Public Health Nursing: Population-Centered Health Care in The Community (7th ed.) Veledar, E., Fazel, R., Shaw, L., Fazlibegovic, E., & Hadziomerovic, M. (2010). Analyzing recent trends in coronary heart disease (CHD) deaths among the elderly in the United