What are proximal and distal factors?

What are proximal and distal factors?

Factors that affect health are often described as either “proximal” (downstream or directly affecting health) or “distal” (upstream or indirectly affecting health). For example, income is thought of as distal (upstream) because it doesn’t directly affect health.

What is the difference between proximal and distal?

In medicine, it refers to parts of the body further away from the center. For example, the hand is distal to the shoulder. Distal is the opposite of proximal. Distal refers to distance, while proximal indicates proximity.

What are distal causes?

Quick Reference. A cause that underlies or is remote from the more obvious direct cause of a departure from good health. For example, atmospheric contamination with ozone-destroying substances, such as chlorofluorocarbon compounds, is a distal cause of skin cancer due to increased ultraviolet radiation flux.

What is an example of a proximal determinant of health?

First, there are proximal determinants of health. These have a direct impact on the physical, emotional, mental and or spiritual health of an individual, and include employment, income and education.

What is a distal determinant of health?

Distal determinants of health include the national, institutional, political, legal, and cultural factors that indirectly influence health by acting on the more proximal factors, their interrelated mechanisms, levels, trends, and distributions. These distal factors are usually more stable than proximal determinants.

What are proximal factors?

A proximal risk factor is a risk factor that precipitates a disease, such as BPD. They represent an immediate vulnerability for a particular condition or event. Sometimes proximal risk factors cause or shape an event.

What is difference distal?

Proximal and distal: These two terms are almost always used in reference to relative locations of parts or places on the limbs. Proximal then refers to something closer to the torso while distal refers to parts and places away from the torso.

What is a proximal cause of disease?

A proximate cause is an event which is closest to, or immediately responsible for causing, some observed result. This exists in contrast to a higher-level ultimate cause (or distal cause) which is usually thought of as the “real” reason something occurred.

What are distal determinants?

What is proximal health?

Proximal means nearer to the center (trunk of the body) or to the point of attachment to the body. If another reference point is given, such as the heart, the proximal point of another organ or extremity is the point closest to the heart, central rather than peripheral.

What are proximal influences?

Proximal influences refer to current individual, social, or economic resources; whereas distal influences are defined as past personal experiences in cumulative life events or achievements (e.g., education) and historical events (Brown & Anderson, 1991; Martin & Martin, 2002; Wheaton, 1994).

What are distal factors?

Distal factors. are predisposing processes, which directly and indirectly shape stressors, resources, coping processes, and outcomes; they are distal in relation to stress reactions and coping.

What is proximal and distal stimulus?

Distal Stimulus is any physical object or event in the external world that reflects light. This light or energy, called the proximal stimulus, is what excites the receptors on our eyes, leading to visual perception.

What is a distal risk factor?

A distal risk factor is a risk factor that represents an underlying vulnerability for a particular condition or event. This does not predict that the condition or event will definitely happen or that it will happen any time soon, but rather that a person may be at risk for the condition at some time in the future.

What does proximal mean in medical terms?

In medical terminology, distal and proximal, or distally and proximally, describe anatomical locations. Proximal means closest to, and distal means farthest away. With reference to a wound on an arm, distal to the wound would be past the wound toward the fingers.