Epidemiologist
An epidemiologist is a specialist who studies epidemics, that is, mass diseases, and measures to counter them.
The duties of an epidemiologist include: analysis of the epidemiological situation in a particular region, study of foci of infection, development of measures aimed at suppressing the epidemic and their prevention in the future.
Epidemiologists exercise control over public catering establishments, treatment facilities and other institutions whose activities can harm the health and life of the population.
There are six directions in epidemiology:
- The epidemiology of infectious diseases is an essential part of general science, one of the first to emerge in the time of Hippocrates. She studies the ways of spreading bacteria and viruses, including especially dangerous ones, and organizes anti-epidemic measures, and also develops methods for the prevention of infectious diseases. The well-known vaccination, which has put a barrier to epidemics of especially dangerous infections, is the result of the work of specialists in this area;
- Epidemiology of noncommunicable diseases - the sphere of action of this direction is the study and development of measures to counter diseases that take the scale of epidemics, but are not caused by infectious agents. Examples include cardiovascular disease, diabetes mellitus, cancer;
- Military epidemiology - provides anti-epidemic measures in relation to the army in war and peacetime;
- Landscape epidemiology is the study of mass morbidity in any region associated with the characteristics of the area, including the vectors of diseases living there. An example of a disease that landscape epidemiologists are dealing with is tick-borne encephalitis;
- Environmental Epidemiology - studies cases of massive human diseases caused by unfavorable environmental conditions. For example, the effect of factory emissions on the incidence of lung cancer in a particular locality is being studied;
- Pharmacoepidemiology is a science formed by the fusion of pharmacology and epidemiology. In the area of her interests, the influence of pharmacological drugs on large groups of people, optimization of the distribution of pharmaceuticals, the formation of lists of essential drugs and recommendations for their use, depending on the epidemiological situation in a particular area.
When do you go to an epidemiologist?
An epidemiologist works with large amounts of information without contacting directly with the patient. Figuratively speaking, if doctors of other specialties save people, then epidemiologists save entire populations.
Most often in everyday life, people are faced with the results of the work of epidemiologists when vaccinating - whether it is routine vaccination of children or rabies vaccinations (against rabies). But even in this case, the patient does not face the epidemiologist directly.
What kind of research does the epidemiologist do?
Epidemiological diagnostics combines methods of studying the spread of diseases, factors contributing to this and assessing the epidemic situation in a certain area. This is a very important task, since the result of epidemiological diagnostics is the forecast of the epidemic situation and the development of measures to counter possible or existing epidemics.
The following methods of epidemiological diagnosis are used:
- Descriptive and evaluative;
- Analysis of information;
- Experimental (putting forward certain hypotheses and testing them);
- Forecast.
The result of this work is:
- Recommendations for behavior in a specific epidemiological setting;
- Development of measures to counter mass diseases (development of a set of rules for doctors regarding the treatment of a particular disease that has become widespread);
- Prevention of epidemics (including immunization of the population and health education).
To some, the work of an epidemiologist may seem boring and not as important as, say, the work of a surgeon, but this is far from the case. Over the course of its history, humanity has literally stood on the brink of extinction several times due to epidemics - remember the terrible epidemics of the plague, the "black death" that mow down entire countries. In order to prevent this from happening again, to prevent the return of epidemics of cholera, smallpox, diphtheria, epidemiologists are working.
New times create new challenges, not letting us rest on our laurels. Defeating tuberculosis, stopping the AIDS epidemic, coping with the scourge of our time - cardiovascular diseases - this is an incomplete list of tasks of modern epidemiology.
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