The Causes Of Transmission Based diseases and Precautions For Medical Assistants are,
When the CDC was in the process of developing a new guideline for isolation precautions in hospitals, the agency arrived at what it terms two tiers of precautions. The first tier is called the standard precautions, discussed earlier in this chapter, designed for all patients regardless of their diagnosis or presumed infection status. The second tier of precautions is intended for patients diagnosed with or suspected of specific highly transmissible diseases. These are known as transmission-based precautions.
Transmission-based precautions condense the seven existing categories of isolation precautions developed by the CDC in 1970 into three sets of precautions based on routes of infection. Released in 1996 to complement standard precautions, transmission-based precautions reduce the risk of airborne, drop-let, and contact transmission of pathogens and are always to be used in addition to standard precautions. These airborne, contact, and droplet precautions also list specific syndromes that can appear in adult and pediatric patients who are highly suspicious for infection. They identify the appropriate transmission-based precautions to be used until a diagnosis can be made.
Causes of Disease and Disease Transmission
When providing patients with health care, medical assistants run the risk of contracting, or acquiring, an infection from pathogens that are causing patients' illnesses. Such pathogens are viruses, bacteria, fungi, and others that can be found in patients' blood and body fluids. In medical offices, ambulatory care centers, and hospitals, many ill patients are seen every day. Pathogens can be easily transmitted to another person if care is not taken to prevent such an occurrence. Consistent use and adherence to infection control measures significantly reduce the risk of disease transmission. The CDC recommends that health care providers consider each patient to be potentially infectious for AIDS, hepatitis B, and other bloodborne pathogens and to routinely and conscientiously apply the techniques of standard precautions as a means of infection control.