The key difference between prevention and cure is that prevention reduces the weight and impact of disease and maintains the overall quality of a healthy life, while cure focuses on removing the disease from the body.
Prevention and cure are two types of health care and common terms used in the medical industry. Prevention mainly focuses on detecting and preventing medical conditions before they become serious. It helps to reduce the risk factors and minimize effects early. A cure is stopping a medical condition and completely resolving it. Prevention is preferable to cure since it is the initial step towards health. Therefore, stopping a problem before it arises proves the phrase ‘prevention is better than cure.’
CONTENTS
1. Overview and Key Difference
2. What is Prevention
3. What is Cure
4. Similarities – Prevention and Cure
5. Prevention vs Cure in Tabular Form
6. Summary – Prevention vs Cure
What is Prevention?
Prevention in healthcare is the decrease of a weight of a disease or illness and its associated risk factors. Various preventive measures are applied throughout life to prevent many illnesses over time. There are four levels of prevention in healthcare. They are primordial levels of prevention, primary prevention, secondary prevention, and tertiary prevention.
Primordial prevention provides actions to prevent future hazards to health and to decrease the factors that increase the risk of diseases. Examples of primordial prevention are proper sanitation, an approach to green energy, and promoting healthy lifestyles from childhood. Primary prevention reduces risk factors that develop during a disease. This, in turn, prevents the onset of chronic diseases. Such type of prevention reduces risk through exposure and behavior. An example of primary prevention is reducing the risk of cardiovascular diseases through a healthy diet and not smoking. Vaccination is also primary prevention. Secondary prevention is involved in the identification and treatment of preclinical changes. Screening procedures for diseases are an example of secondary prevention. Tertiary prevention involves delaying or reversing the disease. It helps in reducing the impact of the diseases on the patient’s life.
What is Cure?
A cure is a procedure that ends a medical condition. A cure can be a medication, a change in lifestyle, or a surgical operation. Medical conditions such as diseases, genetic disorders, illnesses, or simple health conditions need a cure. However, there are also incurable diseases. The proportion of people with diseases that are cured through treatment is known as the cure rate or cure fraction.
A cure involves treating a disease to lessen its effects and symptoms of a disease. For example, treating a fungal reaction on the skin using antifungal ointments or cream destroy the fungus causing the disease. However, when diseases cannot be cured, doctors use various treatments to control them. An example of such a situation is treating diabetes patients using insulin injections.
What are the Similarities Between Prevention and Cure?
- Prevention and cure help to maintain better health conditions and quality of life.
- Both help in reducing risks.
- They help to reduce the severity, effects, symptoms, and impact of the disease or illness.
What is the Difference Between Prevention and Cure?
Prevention reduces the weight and impact of a disease and maintains the overall quality of a healthy life, while cure focuses on removing the disease from the body. This is the key difference between prevention and cure. Prevention targets a population or community, while cure mostly targets a single subject. Moreover, prevention does not always involve the use of medication, while cure mainly involves the use of medication.
The following table summarizes the difference between prevention and cure.
Summary – Prevention vs Cure
Prevention and cure play vital roles in health care. Prevention reduces the weight and impact of disease and maintains the overall quality of a healthy life. On the other hand, cure focuses on removing the disease from the body. There are four levels of prevention and they are primordial prevention, primary prevention, secondary prevention, and tertiary prevention. A cure is a process that includes either a medication, a change in lifestyle, or a surgical operation. This summarizes the difference between prevention and cure.
Reference:
1. Choudhury, Kaushiki Datta. “5 Differences between Preventive and Curative Health Care.” Loop Health Icon, Loop Health.
2. “What Is Preventive Healthcare?” Colleaga.
Image Courtesy:
1. “Coronavirus COVID-19 prevention” By Creazilla.com – (CC0) via Commons Wikimedia
2. “Cure – Medicine” (CC0) via Pxhere