Topics 12, 13, 14: Psychological Health, Healthy Aging, and Introduction to Epidemiology

This set of flashcards covers key concepts related to psychological health, healthy aging, and the fundamentals of epidemiology.

Psychological Health

• our capacity to think, feel, and behave in ways that contribute to our ability to enjoy life and manage challenges

• influenced by lifestyle behaviours, sleep patterns, relationship issues, home life

Meeting Life’s Challenges

1. Psychological development

2. achieving healthy self-esteem

3. optimism

4. honest communication

5. dealing with loneliness

6. dealing with anger

Developing an Adult Identity

• a unified sense of self with attitudes, beliefs, and ways of acting that are truly your own

• importance of role models

• enables ability to form relationships

Achieving Healthy Self-Esteem

• seeing yourself as good, competent, worthy of love

• positive self image begins in childhood

Cognitive Distortions

Patterns of thinking that lead to negative beliefs and attitudes, such as overgeneralizing or expecting the worst.

Optimism

A hopeful attitude that can combat pessimism, which may be a symptom or cause of depression.

Honest Communication

The ability to express feelings and wants without fear of rejection, and to appropriately say yes or no.

Dealing with Loneliness

The state of being alone that can induce fear, necessitating skills to enjoy one’s own company.

Dealing with Anger

Never expressing anger or opinion that might offend others, even when own rights are compromised

Anxiety Disorders

Mental health disorders characterized by excessive fear, anxiety, and avoidance that affect daily life.

Anxiety: Simple Phobia

fear of something definite (spiders, heights, etc) (8%)

Anxiety: Social Phobia

fear of humiliation while others are watching (7%)

Anxiety: Panic Disorder

severe anxiety attacks with physical symptoms (1%)

Generalized Anxiety Disorder

excessive worry about regular concerns displaces other thoughts (1%)

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

obsessions: recurrent unwanted thoughts or impulses

compulsions: repetitive, difficult to resist actions

Behavioural Addictions

intense urges to engage in behaviour

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

re-living trauma in dreams or intrusive flashbacks

Depression

A mood disorder characterized by persistent sadness, loss of interest, and other significant impairments, more common in women.

Mania

restlessness, lots of energy, little sleep needed, inflated self-esteem

Bipolar Disorder

A mood disorder involving alternating episodes of mania and depression.

Suicide Warning Signs

Indicators of severe depression, including social withdrawal and expressing a desire to die.

Schizophrenia

involves a disturbance in thinking and in perceiving reality

Healthy Aging

The process of maintaining physical, mental, and social health as one ages, with an emphasis on positive lifestyle factors.

Successful Aging

absence of disease and related disability and high cognitive and physical functional capacity plus active engagement in life

inclusion of physical, mental, and social health

Compression of Morbidity

The concept that the period of illness and disability can be minimized in relation to an individual's lifespan.

Changes that Occur with Aging

• decreases in fitness

• changes in body composition

• osteoporosis

• sarcopenia

• changes in brain

Osteoporosis

• abnormal decalcification of bones causing loss of bone density and increased fracture risk throughout life

Alzheimer's Disease

A progressive neurological disorder that is not a normal part of aging and affects cognitive functions significantly.

Issues in Aging

• Nutritional Needs

• Substance misuse or abuse

• Depression

• Grief

• Suicide

Issues in Aging: Nutritional Needs

• often lack folate, magnesium, calcium, zinc, vitamin b, c, d, e

• reasons: illness, absorption issues, cannot swallow food, ability to cook/drive, costs

Issues in Aging: Substance Misuse and Abuse

• over two thirds of seniors take 2-d period of medication

• most common misused are sleeping pills, pain meds, laxatives

Issues in Aging: Depression

• often seen as a normal part of aging

• declining health, loss of independence or loved ones, social isolation, physical limitations

Issues in Aging: Grief

• aging is associated with loss

• grieving may continue for years

Issues in Aging: Suicide

• more common in elderly men than women

• men >80 have highest suicide rates in canada

• main factors: terminal illness, loss of economic status, social isolation

Epidemiology

The study of the distribution and determinants of health, disease, and injuries in human populations.

Epidemiology Assumptions

1. human disease does not occur at random

2. human disease has casual and preventive factors that can be identified through a systemic investigation

Greek Epidemiology

• the study of what is upon the people

• describes the frequency and patterns of morbidity and mortality in terms of person, place, or time

• goal: explain the occurrence of health, disease, injury or health related conditions in a group of people

Epidemiology Applications

• identifying risk factors for disease —> disease causation

• efficacy: in a lab setting, controlled

• effectiveness: how it works in a real world, not controlled

Outbreak = Epidemic

a clear increase in number of cases of a disease or health related condition over normal baseline levels

Pandemic

epidemic that has crossed geographic regions

Pyramid of Disease

1. Diseased, diagnosed and controlled

2. Diagnosed, uncontrolled

3. Undiagnosed or wrongly diagnosed disease

4. Risk factors for disease

5. Free of risk factors

Types of Epidemiology

Descriptive

Analytic

Clinical

Descriptive Epidemiology

A branch of epidemiology that focuses on the who, where, and when of health-related states.

Analytic Epidemiology

A branch of epidemiology that investigates the reason or cause of health outcomes, testing hypotheses.

Clinical Epidemiology

Patient oriented in seeking to aid decision making about diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment of disease

goal: prevent, reduce, and control morbidity and mortality in humans

Evolution of Epidemiology

• started as an attempt to explain disease in a systemic way

• Black Death: 1347 - 1351; killed 25 million in Western Europe

Early Pioneers: Hippocrates

• 460 - 377 BC

• one of the first to base his conclusions on observations with rational explanations

• associated with environmental factors

Factors Causing Disease Might be Sought in:

• Air: hot and cold winds

• Water: marshy, soft, hard

• Places: lacking vegetation, lacking water, too much water, etc

• Personal Habits: drinking, excess eating, lack of exercise

John Graunt (1620 - 1674)

• father of biostatistics

• first to take data and find patterns

• developed quantitive methods

Dr. John Snow (1813 - 1858)

• The father of modern epidemiology, known for discovering the waterborne transmission of cholera through his investigation of the 1854 outbreak in London, where he mapped cases and notably removed the handle of the contaminated water pump

James Lind (1716 - 1794)

• naval surgeon that divided twelve soldiers with scurvy into 6 groups and gave them different foods

• discovered the ones who had been given cirrus (vit c) became no longer sick

Edward Jenner (1749 - 1823)

• The pioneer of vaccination who developed the smallpox vaccine using cowpox

• paved the way for preventative medicine

Austin Bradford Hill (1897 - 1991)

• 1950’s study proved a relation between smoking and lung cancer

• developed a check list to judge causality

Hill Criteria (1965)

• strength

• consistency

• specificity

• temporality

• biological gradient

• plausibility

• coherence

• experimental evidence

• analogy

20th Century Epidemiology

• Framingham Heart Study (1948): coined term “risk factors”

• US national examination survey (1959): random testing

• Canadian health measures survey (2007) random testing and giving health info