Disease Prevention and Screening
Disease Prevention and Screening Guidelines
Screening for disease is one of our duties as primary care doctors.
Early detection and risk screening for conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, cervical cancer, breast cancer, colon cancer and prostate cancer can mean the difference between a healthy normal life and a tragic one.
Prevention of disease is at least as important as screening for disease.
Prevention
Prevention involves adopting a healthy lifestyle, avoiding unhealthy habits, vaccinations and the treatment of other risk factors. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) provides great resources for information on prevention.
For an up-to-date resource on vaccinations, click here.
For further reading on Vaccine Safety, click here.
For resources on healthy lifestyle issues (nutrition, exercise and weight management), click here.
For information on the dangers of smoking and for help with quitting, click here.
Screening
Screening is based on risk. An individual’s risk of disease is based on age, gender and other factors like risky behaviors or lifestyle. Various guidelines have been proposed. We tend to use the guidelines listed by the Department of Health and Human Services as proposed by the U.S. Preventative Services Task Force (USPSTF). These guidelines are based on all of the current available knowledge and evidence concerning these conditions.
For a brief and simple table of some common screening guidelines, click here.
For a complete list of screening procedures and the USPSTF’s recommendations, click here.
For apps to see what screenings that you are due for, click here.
If you have questions about health screening, or feel that you are behind in screening or other health maintenance issues such as vaccines, please contact us or schedule an appointment.
Remember, the key to good health is managing risk.
For Medicare patients, please click here for a your health maintenance needs.
Sincerely,
The Doctors at MACM, PC
http://www.ahrq.gov/clinic/pocketgd08/
http://www.healthfinder.gov/prevention/TopicsAtoZ.aspx
http://epss.ahrq.gov/ePSS/Topics.do?ttid=1
http://epss.ahrq.gov/ePSS/GetResults.do?new=true
PDF - Description of Child and Adol Vaccines
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/recs/schedules/default.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/dnpa/index.htm
http://www.ahrq.gov/clinic/uspstfix.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/basic_information/index.htm