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PREVENTION
Compliance
The role of patient compliance and participation in health
promotion and disease prevention cannot be underestimated. According to
the CDC, most health burdens are linked to a few harmful behaviors.
Behavioral modification on the part of the patient is crucial to effective
primary prevention.
The most difficult and perplexing task of any intervention
based on behavioral change is sustained compliance. Can compliance be
insured after the program is over? This is where patient education and
counseling plays its role. When patients are given skills that they can
use, in any situation, in any setting, and without the aid of “props”,
this can be accomplished. Recommending the proper diet is laudable;
however it is useless if the foods are unavailable in the community or too
expensive for the patient to incorporate into a routine diet. The annual
routine physical examination was proposed by the AMA in 1922 47.
Since then, this has been revised with attention to evidence of behavioral
patterns in high-risk groups 48. The perfect routine
examination can only be useful if the patient present. What influences
the seemingly healthy individual to attend annual physical examinations?
Many individuals will only seek health services when ill or
seriously injured. Once the clinical symptoms of the disease have
developed the mission is to slow the progression of the disease, or to
prevent further damage or co-morbid conditions from developing. Seldom can
the disease process be fully reversed in the case of chronic illness.
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