Discussion Board: Infectious Diseases in Your Community

Overview

In this module, you were introduced to infectious diseases. Use what you learned about this topic to review the scenario and participate in the discussion.

Instructions

respond to it in an initial post using the discussion prompts to guide your content.

Scenario

You are an epidemiologist and/or health care communications expert for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. You are responsible for disseminating information to your peers regarding an infectious disease in a professional but educational way. The dissemination should include graphics or videos to highlight a specific disease.

Using your local health district website, look up the statistics or surveillance report for infectious diseases in your community. Locate your local health district using the NACCHO website Links to an external site.. Here is an example for the Southern Nevada Health District Links to an external site..

Choose one disease in the latest report. Then, use the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (n.d.) Links to an external site.and/or other government (.gov) or organizational (.org) websites to answer the discussion prompts provided.

Discussion Prompts: Initial Post

• What disease did you choose, and why?
• What is the causative agent (bacteria, virus, fungus, etc.) of this disease?
• Describe the causative agent. Where can it be found? How can it be transmitted? What are the risk factors attributed to getting this disease? This is where a graphic or video will help!
• Discuss the signs and symptoms of the disease.
• Discuss the diagnostic testing of the disease.
• Discuss the possible treatments of the disease.
• If there are statistics related to the disease, please include these as well. For example, how many people may have had this disease in the last year? In the last 100 years? Have there been any recent outbreaks?

Discussion Prompts: Responses Posts

• Incorporate additional information related to the disease you are responding to. This should include statewide or even worldwide statistics of the disease you choose from the World Health Organization (n.d.).Links to an external site.

Remember: You are the "expert" on this disease, and you should communicate reliable information to your peers from reliable website sources (CDC, .org, .gov). It is recommended that you also utilize the LIRN Library when conducting research for this activity. You can access the LIRN Library in your Canvas navigation bar. It is always helpful to add videos, pictures, and/or infographics for your initial and response posts, but please be sure to cite them. All discussion posts should include citations of a website or textbook, and all citations should be in APA 7th edition format.

In addition, you may NOT replicate another student's disease. This will be a great showcase of other infectious diseases that you may currently see in your county or city!

Citations:

National Association of County and City Health Officials. (n.d.). Directory of local health departments. https://www.naccho.org/membership/lhd-directory