L2 - Abnormality

• Define normal

  Absence of infection, disease, or malformation. Absence of experimental, or therapeutic manipulations
• What are the criteria of abnormal

  1. Being unusual
  2. Being sick
  3. Being treatable
• What are the types of abnormalities?

  • physical abnormality
  • functional abnormality
  • biochemical abnormality
  • psychological abnormality
  • genetical abnormality
  • immunological abnormality
• Ways clinical distinguish normal from abnormal

  • Data: how biological phenomena are measured
  • Variation: how they vary
  • Distribution: how they are summarised
• 2 types of data

  1. problem list: a statement of the patient's important medical problem
  2. raw data: used to classify the medical problem
• 2 sources of variation

  • Measurement: instrument & observer
  • Biologic: within individuals & between individuals
• 2 types of distribution

  1. central tendency: mean, mode, median
  2. dispersion: range, standard deviation, percentile
• Describe the criteria to categorise normal and abnormal, while using suitable examples: Being unusual

  
  

  • normal is defined as most frequently occurring, anything less frequent is considered abnormal
  • statistically, the number representing whether the person is abnormal is by taking the standard deviation
  • when the SD value is more than 2 than the mean, it is considered abnormal
  • however, considering the SD value alone can be ambiguous and misleading at times, such as obesity is an abnormal condition, but from the normal distribution, it is located at normal mean or normal value
• Describe the criteria to categorise normal and abnormal, while using suitable examples: Being sick

  • a person having the disease and is not in their best condition is abnormal
  • does not matter whether it is communicable or non-communicable disease
• Describe the criteria to categorise normal and abnormal, while using suitable examples: Being treatable

  • it is closely related to being unusual except the changes after being treated is the main interest to categorise someone as abnormal
  • example, is a certain treatment, rehabilitation, or medical advice after showing unusual symptoms make a difference to a person by returning them to their usual condition, then it is abnormal
  • the end condition is what is being observed (not the early or mid-condition)