Prophylactic refers to prophylaxis and means preventive, being used to designate something capable of preventing or alleviating a certain disease (prophylactic measures/actions, prophylactic treatment).
The term "prophylactic" comes from prophylaxis, from the Greek prophylaxis = caution.
Prophylaxis can be defined as a set of measures aimed at preventing, at the population level, a disease.
Prophylactic measures are used in order to prevent or reduce the risk of transmission of a disease, protecting the population from the occurrence or evolution of a phenomenon unfavorable to the health.
Something that is prophylactic aims to prevent the introduction of diseases into a population, control and/or prevent the emergence of new cases of diseases that already exist and reduce the effects of the disease when it is no longer possible avoid it.
At prophylactic actions/measures can be established according to levels of prevention, corresponding to periods in the natural history of the disease.
At primary prevention
, the measures are applied in the pre-pathogenic period of the disease, preventing it from being introduced into the ecosystem and, consequently, into people or animals. Includes unspecific and specific actions:- Non-specific actions: Conditions for adapting to the environment, shelter or housing, food, leisure, social interaction or population density, educational and sanitation actions;
- Specific actions: They target a certain disease through vaccines or the use of specific (prophylactic) medications.
THE secondary prevention it is done when primary prophylactic measures are unsuccessful. In this case, actions are directed towards the sources of infection.
THE tertiary prevention corresponds to measures applied to the consequences of a given disease, such as functional disability, by example, in which the prophylactic treatment aims at the individual's partial or total recovery, reintegrating him to the society.