A disease is an abnormal condition affecting the body of an organism. It is often construed to be a medical condition associated with specific symptoms and signs. It may be caused by external factors, such as infectious disease, or it may be caused by internal dysfunctions, such as autoimmune diseases. In humans, "disease" is often used more broadly to refer to any condition that causes pain, dysfunction, distress, social problems, or death to the person afflicted, or similar problems for those in contact with the person. In this broader sense, it sometimes includes injuries, disabilities, disorders, syndromes, infections, isolated symptoms, deviant behaviors, and atypical variations of structure and function, while in other contexts and for other purposes these may be considered distinguishable categories. Diseases usually affect people not only physically, but also emotionally, as contracting and living with many diseases can alter one's perspective on life, and their personality.
Death due to disease is called death by natural causes. There are four main types of disease: pathogenic disease, deficiency disease, hereditary disease, and physiological disease.
Diseases can also be classified as communicable and non-communicable disease.
Read more about Disease: Causes and Transmissibility, Burdens of Disease, Prevention, Treatments, Epidemiology, Social and Cultural Responses
Other articles related to "disease":
... in the Fertile Crescent in Western Asia, and it is likely that coeliac disease did not occur before this time ... malodorous and flatulent, and the disease was intractable and liable to periodic return ... The cause, according to Aretaeus, was sometimes either another chronic disease or even consuming "a copious draught of cold water." The paediatrician Samuel Gee gave the first modern-day ...
... A tiny minority of patients suffer from refractory disease, which means they do not improve on a gluten-free diet ... This may be because the disease has been present for so long that the intestines are no longer able to heal on diet alone, or because the patient is not adhering to the diet, or because the patient ...
... Coeliac disease ( /ˈsiːli.æk/ spelled celiac disease in North America and often celiac sprue) is an autoimmune disorder of the small intestine that occurs in genetically predisposed people ... Coeliac disease is caused by a reaction to gliadin, a prolamin (gluten protein) found in wheat, and similar proteins found in the crops of the tribe Triticeae (which includes other common grains such as barley and rye) ... While the disease is caused by a reaction to wheat proteins, it is not the same as wheat allergy ...
... Coeliac disease has been linked with a number of conditions ... In many cases, it is unclear whether the gluten-induced bowel disease is a causative factor or whether these conditions share a common predisposition ... IgA deficiency is present in 2.3% of patients with coeliac disease, and in turn, this condition features a tenfold increased risk of coeliac disease ...
... People use metaphors to make sense of their experiences with disease ... The metaphors move disease from an objective thing that exists to an affective experience ... metaphors draw on military concepts Disease is an enemy that must be feared, fought, battled, and routed ...
Famous quotes containing the word disease:
“Hastiness and superficiality are the psychic diseases of the twentieth century, and more than anywhere else this disease is reflected in the press.”
—Alexander Solzhenitsyn (b. 1918)
“Your responsibility as a parent is not as great as you might imagine. You need not supply the world with the next conqueror of disease or a major movie star. If your child simply grows up to be someone who does not use the word “collectible” as a noun, you can consider yourself an unqualified success.”
—Fran Lebowitz (20th century)
“Narcissist: psychoanalytic term for the person who loves himself more than his analyst; considered to be the manifestation of a dire mental disease whose successful treatment depends on the patient learning to love the analyst more and himself less.”
—Thomas Szasz (b. 1920)