d. Prevention and identification of abuse within families.
e. Maintenance of the tuberculosis registry.
1-8.
OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH
Each preventive medicine activity maintains a Local Health Hazard Inventory
(LOHHI). The LOHHI identifies job-related chemical or physical hazards for military and
civilian personnel. This information is then used to plan specific medical surveillance for
those personnel potentially exposed to job related hazards. Hearing and vision
monitoring are done routinely for all personnel. Note that active duty personnel are
covered under the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) except in times of
national emergency.
1-9.
HOSPITAL ACQUIRED INFECTION CONTROL
Hospital acquired infections are a significant burden on the military in both
financial loss and personnel loss. Approximately three percent of all admissions stay an
extra 7-10 days because of hospital acquired infections. Each hospital has an infection
control committee and an infection control program to prevent or control hospital-
acquired infections. Additionally, the Surgeon General of the Army has mandated that
medical treatment facilities (MTF) in the continental US will be accredited by the Joint
Commission for the Accreditation of Hospitals (JCAH). The JCAH requires that a
hospital have an ongoing hospital wide infection control program for both inpatient and
outpatient services.
1-10. MEDICAL ENTOMOLOGY
Preventive medicine is responsible for control and surveillance of medically
important arthropods such as mosquitoes, ticks, and flies and for control of rodents.
1-11. FIELD PREVENTIVE MEDICINE
It is impossible in a tactical situation for preventive medicine to function in the
same manner as in a garrison situation. Thus emphasis in the field is on those
preventive measures which will have the greatest impact on lowering disease or injury.
The major causes of health problems to a force in the field are food and water-borne
disease, arthropod-borne disease, heat-related injury, and cold related injury.
Countermeasures against these threats will be discussed later in the subcourse.
1-12. GROUPS OF COMMUNICABLE DISEASES
For convenience, communicable diseases may be classified into five groups:
respiratory, intestinal, arthropod-borne, venereal, and miscellaneous. Some of the
diseases in these groups are transmitted by water and are classed as waterborne
diseases. A disease may be classified in more than one way. In this text, diseases are
classified according to manner of transmission or spread and type of control measure
needed to prevent their spread.
MD0008
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