The Differences And Similarities Of Pneumonia And Tuberculosis

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Term Paper Title	The Differences And Similarities Of Pneumonia And Tuberculosis
# of Words	2351
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	9.4

The Differences and Similarities of Pneumonia and Tuberculosis

The Differences and Similarities of Pneumonia and Tuberculosis

     Pneumonia and tuberculosis have been plaguing the citizens of the world
for centuries causing millions of deaths.  This occurred until the creation and
use of antibiotics become more widely available.  These two respiratory
infections have many differences, which include their etiology, incidence and
prevalence, and many similarities in their objective and subject indicators,
medical interventions, course, rehabilitation and effects.

     To explore the relationship between pneumonia and tuberculosis we will
examine a case study.  Joan is a 35 year old women who was feeling fine up till
a few weeks ago when she develop a sore throat.  Since her sore throat she had
been experiencing chest pain, a  loss of appetite, coughing and a low fever so
she went to visit her doctor.  Her doctor admitted her to the hospital with
bacterial pneumonia and after three days of unsuccessful treatment it was
discovered that she actually had active tuberculosis. This misdiagnosis shows
the similarities between the two diseases and how easily they can be confused.

Pneumonia

        Pneumonia is a serious infection or inflammation of the lungs with
exudation and consolidation.  Pneumonia can be one of two types: lobar pneumonia
or bronchial pneumonia.  Lobar pneumonia affects one lobe of a lung while
bronchial pneumonia affects the areas closest to the bronchi (O'Toole, 1992).
In the United States over three million people are infected with pneumonia each
year; five percent of which die.

Etiology

     There are over 30 causes for pneumonia however there are 4 main causes
which are bacterial, viral, mycoplasma and fungal (American Lung Association,
1996).  Bacterial pneumonia attacks everyone from young to old, however
"alcoholics, the debilitated, post-operative patients, people with respiratory
disease or viral infections and people who have weakened immune systems are at
greater risk" (American Lung Association, 1996).  The Pneumococcusis bacteria,
which is classified as Streptococcus pneumoniae, causes bacterial pneumonia and
can be prevented by a vaccine.  In 20 - 30% of the cases the infection spreads
to the blood stream (MedicineNet, 1997) which can lead to secondary infections.

     Viral pneumonia accounts for half of all pneumonia cases (American Lung
Association, 1996) unfortunately there is no effective treatment because
antibiotics do not affec...

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