Health promotion and person-to-person disease outbreaks
Glenn Laverack in Health Promotion in Disease Outbreaks and Health Emergencies, 2017
Polio (poliomyelitis) is a highly infectious disease caused by a virus. It invades the nervous system and can cause irreversible paralysis in a matter of hours. Polio mainly affects children under 5 years old and is spread through person-to-person contact and through the contamination of water and food. When a child is infected with poliovirus, the virus enters the body through the mouth and multiplies in the intestine. It is then shed into the environment through the faeces where it can spread rapidly through a community, especially in overcrowded conditions of poor hygiene and sanitation. However, if a sufficient number of people, including children, are immunised against polio, the virus is unable to find susceptible people to infect and eventually is eradicated. Most people infected with the poliovirus have no signs of illness and are unaware that they have been infected. In others, initial symptoms include fever, fatigue, headache, vomiting, stiffness in the neck and pain in the limbs. The symptomless people can then spread the infection to others before the first case of polio emerges. For this reason, a single confirmed case of polio paralysis is considered to be evidence of an outbreak, particularly in countries where very few cases normally occur.
Rates and Standardization
Marcello Pagano, Kimberlee Gauvreau in Principles of Biostatistics, 2018
In 1954, a study was undertaken to test the effectiveness of the poliomyelitis vaccine developed by Dr. Jonas Salk. Poliomyelitis is a communicable illness caused by the poliovirus; it ranges in severity from a mild infection to fatal paralytic disease. The clinical trial consisted of two separate parts, one of which involved randomly assigning first-, second-, and third-graders in the United States and Canada to one of two treatment groups. Members of the first group received the Salk vaccine, while those in the second group were given a placebo, an inert substance that was physically indistinguishable from the true treatment. A total of 749,236 children were eligible for this portion of the study; 401,974 eventually received either the vaccine or the placebo [13]. Listed below are the numbers of reported cases of disease for both the vaccine and the placebo groups. The reported cases are divided into true instances of polio and incorrect diagnoses. The true cases are further broken down depending on whether the disease was paralytic or nonparalytic.
Practice Paper 6: Answers
Anthony B. Starr, Hiruni Jayasena, David Capewell, Saran Shantikumar in Get ahead! Medicine, 2016
Poliomyelitis is caused by the poliovirus. Transmission is primarily through faeco-oral routes and is more common in developing countries. The virus infects the grey matter of the nervous system, especially the anterior horn cells in the lumbar region. Initial infection causes a mild fever and headache, progressing to aseptic meningitis. Weakness then starts in one muscle group and can progress to widespread paresis. Respiratory failure occurs if the intercostal muscles are affected. Diagnosis is confirmed by culturing poliovirus from cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) or stool. Management is with bed rest (as exercise worsens or precipitates paralysis) and ventilation if required. Any muscle weakness that remains after 1 month of initial infection is likely to remain permanent. Prevention of poliomyelitis is with immunization by a live vaccine.
Quality of life for post-polio syndrome: a patient derived, Rasch standard scale
Published in Disability and Rehabilitation, 2018
Carolyn A. Young, Anne-Marie C. Quincey, Samantha M. Wong, Alan Tennant
Poliomyelitis (polio) is an acute, communicable disease caused by poliovirus. The illness has varying degrees of severity, including rapid onset of acute flaccid paralysis. Prior to the development of vaccination programmes in the 1950s, polio was widespread. For example, in America in 1952, there were more than 21,000 paralytic cases.[1] Despite concerted efforts by the WHO and others, such as Rotary International, to ensure widespread vaccination and the eradication of polio, outbreaks of polio continue. From 1976–1995, there were 48 outbreaks of paralytic poliomyelitis, with a cumulative total of ∼17,000 cases reported worldwide.[2] Europe had been declared free of poliovirus from 2002 until an outbreak in 2010 in Tajikistan.[3] A 60% increase in confirmed cases of polio in Pakistan between 2009 and 2010 is a reminder of the persistence of the disease.[4]
Cross-neutralization Capacity of Immune Serum from Different Dosage of Sabin Inactivated Poliovirus Vaccine Immunization against Multiple Individual Polioviruses
Published in Expert Review of Vaccines, 2021
Kai Chu, Weixiao Han, Deyu Jiang, Zhiwei Jiang, Taotao Zhu, Wenbo Xu, Yuemei Hu, Gang Zeng
Poliomyelitis is a paralytic disease caused by any of the three poliovirus types 1, 2, and 3, especially in children aged <5 years [1]. The vaccination era started in 1955 when the inactivated poliovirus vaccine (IPV) developed by Jonas Salk was licensed in the USA, followed by the oral polio vaccine (OPV) by Albert Sabin licensed in 1961 [2]. The widespread introduction of polio vaccines has prompted a rapid decline in cases with poliomyelitis worldwide. Furthermore, the World Health Organization (WHO) launched the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) in 1988, which reduced the global incidence of polio by 99.9% [3,4]. The WHO currently recommends the need to not only rapidly eradicate wild polioviruses but also prevent the occurrence of vaccine-associated paralytic poliomyelitis (VAPP), recurrent circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus (cVDPV), and immunodeficient vaccine-derived poliovirus (iVDPV) [5–7]. The incidence of VAPP is estimated to be 2–4 cases/million birth cohort per year in countries using OPV [8], and the attenuated viruses in live OPV may re-acquire neurovirulence and transmissibility through prolonged replication in an individual or community and finally transform into cVDPVs [9–11].
Self-perceived mobility in immigrants in Sweden living with the late effects of polio
Published in Disability and Rehabilitation, 2020
Helena Selander, Felicia Kjellgren, Katharina S. Sunnerhagen
Although acute poliomyelitis is very rare in industrialized countries [1], 12 to 20 million people globally live with the sequelae of polio [2]. New symptoms may emerge several years after recovery from polio, including new muscle weakness, fatigue, pain and functional loss [3]. Many people who suffer from the late effects of polio have impaired walking ability due to reduced balance, muscle strength and pain, which impacts their daily life [4]. Mobility is of major importance for health, autonomy and well-being [5], and many different lifestyles and living patterns require transportation and mobility [6–8]. Being able to move independently from one place to another is essential for quality of life and for participation in many activities [6–9]. Polio survivors often have impaired muscle function that can result in mobility problems [10]. Community mobility may include walking, using mobility devices, using public transportation like buses or trains, using private transportation such as a ride from a friend or family member and driving a car [11]. A goal in the transport policy in Sweden is that the use of public transportation should be improved by increased safety, reliability and also usability for people with disabilities. Although, the public transportation system is well developed it is not always accessible for all (such as high step to enter the bus/tram) and with a sparse network and low frequencies in the country side. Therefore, Special Transport Service (Taxi) are available but also other types of mobility devices that are subsidized.
Related Knowledge Centers
- Antibody
- Paresthesia
- Poliovirus
- Infection
- Headache
- Feces
- Flaccid Paralysis
- Post-Polio Syndrome
- Fecal–Oral Route
- Physician