DISEASE: SIGNS AND SYMPTOMS

Disease may be acute, chronic, malignant, or benign. Of these terms, chronic and acute have to do with the duration of a disease, malignant and benign with its potentiality for causing death.

An acute disease usually begins abruptly and is over soon. Acute appendicitis, for example, is characterized by vomiting, and pain usually localized in the lower right side. It usually requires immediate surgical treatment. The term chronic refers to a process that often begins very gradually and then persists for a long period. For example, ulcerative colitis is a chronic disease. Its peak incidence is early in the second decade of life. The disease is characterized by relapsing attacks of bloody diarrhea that persist for weeks to months. These attacks alternate with asymptomatic periods that can last from weeks to years.

The terms benign and malignant, most often used to describe tumours, can be used in a more general sense. Benign diseases are generally without complications, and a good prognosis is usual. Malignancy implies a process that, if left alone, will result in fatal illness. Cancer is the general term for all malignant tumours.

Diseases usually are indicated by signs and symptoms. A sign is defined as an objective manifestation of disease that can be determined by a physician; a symptom is subjective evidence of disease reported by the patient. Each disease has a lot of signs and symptoms; individual sign such as fever, however, may be found in a great number of diseases.

Fever is an abnormal rise in body temperature. It is most often a sign of infection but can be present when there is tissue destruction, as, for example, from a severe burn or when large amounts of tissue have died because of lack of blood supply. Fever is a highly significant indicator of disease.

The pulse rate is important information. The heart rate varies with the level of physical activity: the heart beats are faster during exercise and more slowly during rest. An abnormal pulse or heart rate may indicate a disease. The heart rate increases in the feverish patient. A weak, rapid pulse rate may be a sign of severe blood loss or of disease within the heart itself. Irregularity of the pulse is an important indicator of heart malfunction.

The respiratory rate (rate of breathing) is modified by disease. Persons with fever have an increased respiratory rate, which serves to lower body temperature.

Temperature, pulse, and respiratory rate – called the vital signs — may be important manifestations of disease. A fourth vital sign, blood pressure, is equally significant. Among other things, it indicates the amount of blood in circulation.

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