Inconsistencies in the classification of preventive interventions.
OBJECTIVE
Preventive measures are commonly classified into primary (prevention of a disease from occurring), secondary (screening of asymptomatic persons with a view of early detection and treatment of disease), and tertiary (treatment of patients with a view of palliation, cure, rehabilitation, prevention of relapse, or prevention of complications). The objective of the present survey was to assess the adherence to this classification in a sample of abstracts of scientific publications.


METHODS
We searched the literature (key terms prevention and primary, secondary, or tertiary) and identified 317 abstracts describing various preventive interventions. We tabulated the level of prevention as defined in the abstract, by what was done, to whom, and why.


RESULTS
There was a considerable variability in the way the various levels of prevention were defined in the reviewed abstracts.


CONCLUSIONS
The definitions of the levels of prevention are not specific enough to be appropriately used by all. We suggest, therefore, to define clinical interventions by their objective, target population, and type ("reduction of mortality of patients with symptomatic ventricular ectopy by beta-blockers"), rather than in terms of level of prevention ("tertiary prevention of ventricular ectopy").
Occupational Health and Rehabilitation Institute, Sackler School of Medical, Tel Aviv University, Ramat Aviv, Israel.
P
P
Froom
J
J
Benbassat
D000043:Abstracting and Indexing / Q000592:standards*; D015982:Bias; D006801:Humans; D011315:Preventive Medicine / Q000145:classification* / Q000379:methods; D011322:Primary Prevention / Q000145:classification* / Q000379:methods; D011643:Publishing / Q000592:standards*; D012046:Rehabilitation / Q000145:classification* / Q000379:methods; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012660:Semantics; D009626:Terminology as Topic