11 december 2015

The study of physiology is  closely related with the study of pathophysiology, which is the analysis of the diseases that take place in the living beings while they carry out their vital functions. When studying the diseases of the living beings, this branch also studies animals, since it has a direct application in the field of veterinary science.

This branch of medicine allows to explain why diseases are produced, how are they produced and which are their symptoms. Pathophysiology describes the “history” of the disease and, once it has reached the living being, it is divided in three phases: initial, clinical and of resolution.

• The initial phase covers the first changes that suffer the organism since the moment in which the disease starts until the moment when the first symptoms are produced. In this phase the patient does not suffer substantial changes since the disease develops without the subject noticing; depending on the disease, this phase has different durations.
• The clinical phase begins when the disease stars to show its characteristic symptoms. These symptoms can appear repeatedly, by episodes or even in serious crisis. They can also repeat during years: once the six-month barrier is passed, the disease will become chronicle. It is in this phase when the adequate treatment must be applied for each condition: it has to be remedied as soon as possible and not extend the disease to ensure in the subject a total recovery without sequelae.
• The resolution phase has different aspects: it can end with the disease, the disease can become chronicle or it can become terminal. The early diagnosis and the knowledge of the disease is key so that the subject do not die.

Pathophysiology is one of the branches of medicine most demanded to this day because the medical research to end with the diseases is a global necessity. One of the conditions with has more studies nowadays is Alzheimer’s disease. Knowing the pathophysiology of this disease is key to know when it begins to develop and be able of getting an early diagnosis that saves the subject of suffering this condition. The Alzheimer’s disease pathophysiology has a multitude of studies to this day thanks to which we know that the disease can be detected up to twenty years before. The research of this affection has numerous resources, both public and private, and is in the spotlight of the most part of the pharmaceutical firms that wan to start distributing medications to treat this disease.

The study of pathophysiology has a great value in medicine and is currently one of the most demanded branches because the control of the diseases is a global objective.   The researchers of this area play today a crucial role, since any advance they carry out can help saving thousands of lives: there still are many unknown diseases and although this science has advanced enormously  in the last two centuries, it still have a long way to go.