Tetanus
Rylee Kehoe
Tetanus
Tetanus is a bad disease that we get vaccines for when we are little. Tetanus can be caused from bacteria, soil, dust, and animal feces. Some of the symptoms you get when you have tetanus are lock jaw, where you jaw locks, and very painful muscle contractions. You can contract the disease from body piercings, tattoos, gunshot wounds, and the injection of drugs. This disease can lead to broken bones and even death.
Cause of Tetanus
Tetanus is usually caused by a certain bacteria called Clostridium Tetani. If you get the vaccine when you are little, you have very little chances of getting the disease. If you don't get the vaccine when you are younger, you are very likely to get tetanus. Tetanus can be caused also by soil, dust, animal feces, foreign bodies, piercings, tattoos, and more. If you live in a country that is in poverty, and you step on metal and or have surgery and get an infection you are very likely to get tetanus.
Defination of Tetanus
Tetanus is a disease that effects your nervous system. Once contracted, you may experience painful muscle contractions in your neck and jaw. It also interferes with your breathing and can lead to death. When you have pain in your jaw, you may have lock jaw. Lock jaw is where your jaw locks because of the muscle contractions.You get vaccines throughout your life to prevent this disease. It is very rare to get tetanus in the US. The risk factor of contracting the disease is higher in the less developed countries. Each year there are as many as a million cases of tetanus. There is no cure to this disease but you are able to take a drug that will relieve the pain in your body. Fatality is very high when you don't get the immunization.
Symptoms of Tetanus
Once you have contracted the disease,, it may take up to a few weeks to start to show symptoms. When you have the disease, you will start experiencing very painful muscle contractions in your neck and jaw. Your jaw will experience spasms and or stiffness. Your neck will feel stiff and it may become hard to swallow. You may also feel stiffness in your abdominal muscles. When you have painful body spasms every few minutes, you should check your surroundings. If you are around a draft, loud noise, touch, and or light, that may be the cause of the body spasms. The cause of this is because the spasms are triggered by minor occurrences. You may also encounter a fever, lots of sweating, high blood pressure, and a rapid heart rate.
Risk Factors of Tetanus
When you get tetanus, you need to think of what happened to you within the last couple of weeks. Certain factors are necessary for the virus to enter your body. If you got a splinter, body piercing, had surgery,or an infection, the disease may have entered your body through there. You may also have gotten the disease for the lack of immunization. The disease is also present to many other different infectious bacteria. You may also have gotten the bacteria in your system through injured tissues. If a foreign object entered your body such as; a splinter, nail, body piercings, injection of drugs, gunshot woulds, tattoos, compound fractures, crash injuries, burns, surgical wounds, ear infection, animal bites, infected foot ulcers, infected umbilical stumps, swelling around an injury and puncture wounds.
Complications of Tetanus
When you have tetanus, you may encounter some disabilities. On you may encounter is broken bones. When you have broken bones you can't get the exercise that you need. You may not even be able that use that limb again. Another disability is mental and physical disabilities. When you have mental disabilities, you may not be able to talk anymore or walk either. If you can't talk, people won't be able to tell what you need to have with you at that time but there are machines that can help with that by understanding what your saying without even talking. With physical disabilities, you may change in appearance. With that said you might loose limbs or loose your eyes sight and may not even be able to talk either. You also may encounter death.
Tests and Diagnosis of Tetanus
When you have tetanus, but the doctor's don't know what you have, they go by physical appearance, symptoms, signs, immunization history, medical history, and by an exam. With this disease, laboratory tests aren't helpful.
Treatment and Drugs for Tetanus
There is no medicated way to cure tetanus, but there are lots of other ways to take care of yourself when you have the disease. You need to take care of your wound by removing dirt, dead tissue, and foreign objects. You may also be suggested to take medicine to remove the pain from your body. You many also have to take antitoxins, antibiotics, sedatives, and many other drugs. There are also therapies that will help you through the time you have the disease.
Maternal and Neonatal Tetanus
Maternal tetanus is when you have the disease and you give birth. You then give the baby tetanus and that is called Neonatal tetanus. Maternal and Neonatal tetanus are abbreviated and MNT.
MNT Elimination Partners
To help eliminate tetanus world wide, the US is fund raising to help get vaccines world wide. We also support others technically and financially. We procure and deliver vaccines to help others in different countries. They monitor the progress in how fast we are eliminating the disease. They also validate the elimination in each country when they have fully eliminated the disease. Last but not least, we work with other countries to think of other strategies to work towards the elimination of tetanus.
MNT.
MNT has killed more than 49,000 newborns in the year of 2013. The infected countries are Africa and Southern and Eastern Europe. This disease happens where women are poor, they have little health care, and little information on safe delivery practices. If it is contracted and you don't have health care, you will have 100% fatality. But when you have health care you fatality rate goes down to between 10% and 60%.
The Solution to MNT
The solution to tetanus is immunization, hygienic health practices, and proper cord in babies.
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