Case+Study+GID2

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Narrowed Topic: TB in Rural China

Opening Paragraph (   Part 3) By: //Angela and Edwin // All around the world, people contract Tuberculosis. About 60 years back, if someone was infected with Tuberculosis, they were pretty much destined for death. Nowadays, after many medical improvements, people can recover from this disease by taking antibiotics. However, many developing countries still lack the necessary facilities needed to cure Tuberculosis. This is where the organization CNTC (Francis J. Curry National Tuberculosis Center) comes in, CNTC conducts workshops that will help educate medical professionals and the general population about tuberculosis. For those who are not able to attend the workshops, CNTC provides free products (CD's, DVD's, books, and video tapes) that will have the same effect as attending the workshops. Also, another organization, TB-ALERT, specializes in teaching India about Tuberculosis and providing mental and emotional support for who contracted TB. This provides the support needed for the patients to finish the 6-9 months of treatment and thus preventing drug-resistant strains from occurring. Our group wants to focus on Rural China. The Chinese Government usually does a good job of providing free medical treatment for TB in China. Therefore, in the Chinese cities, there are very few outbreaks of Tuberculosis. However, in rural areas, the inhabitants often lack facilities needed to cure tuberculosis and key knowledge about tuberculosis. As symptoms include coughing, TB may be mistaken for a simple cold and if the victim fails to receive treatment, it may result in severe illness or even death. We wish to help educate people about TB, how to prevent drug-resistant strains, and even collecting money to help build facilities.  Part 1: By: //Sam // [|TB Alert], it specializes on countries such as Great Britain and India (TB Alert India). It was started in the UK. This group focuses on going into TB clustered areas and helping other local groups working on the same issue. They prefer to add a "social" aspect to the issue which helps the patient. That means they not only teach the people about TB and the actual disease, but they actually have people that make friends with the TB victims and help them feel better emotionally. When they do feel better emotionally, they are more likely to complete the tedious 6-9 months of TB treatment and have good results. They don't only dwell on the education and awareness aspect of this issue (though they do emphasize it), but go forward to show the TB patients that the group is aware of them, cares about them, and is concerned about them. Are the methods used very useful? Do past statistics show a positive change in numbers of TB patients in the areas where projects are executed? Were there problems with locals and local authorities/ local TB prevention groups that may have roused some conflicts? We were previously only considering funding and educating. Now we see a whole new way to help out- make the TB patients feel better mentally and emotionally. It is something we're capable of doing and a very creative idea. We may try to put a variation of this into action. However, we feel that what is more important is education for the people about TB. That is also something we may achieve by ourselves. Therefore, we will do something similar to the plans by TB Alert only if we secure a financial income for our educational and helping needs.
 * What is the organization? **
 * What exactly are they doing to try and combat or change your issue? **
 * What are some of the things you like about their program? **
 * What are some questions you have about it? **
 * How could you become involved with this organization or model your action plan after it? **

Part 2: By: // Edwin // [|Francis J. Curry National Tuberculosis Center (CNTC)] This organization performs research to control and eliminate tuberculosis in the United States and Internationally. CNTC is planning to achieve their goal by educating the populuce and medical professionals more about tuberculosis (such as ways to cure this disease and recognize when a patient has contracted tuberculosis). They are seeking new approaches to teach others more about tuberculosis, such as techniques to cure it. CNTC provides medical training both in groups and individually. They offer courses and workshops, but enrollment is limited. To summarize things, CNTC is trying to eliminate tuberculosis from the universe by starting workshops on tuberculosis. These workshops educate people and medical professionals about handling tuberculosis and how to properly treat someone who is infected by this disease. CNTC also provides free products for those who want to learn about tuberculosis on their own. I really like that this program is providing some free lessons and products about tuberculosis so that anyone can learn more about this disease. I think that this is a good way to eliminate tuberculosis from Earth because giving away free lessons and products will give people more determination to learn more about tuberculosis. This organization has a very big and attractive goal, it kept me thinking for a while (because it seems impossible), but their goal might be accomplished one day. CNTC has a very well thought out plan and description, another good thing is that CNTC has trained professionals working on this case. They are trying to find different approaches that will help people learn more about this issue. What will people learn in the tuberculosis workshops? How will people without internet have access to CTNC’s free products? How is CNTC planning to help educate every single human being about tuberculosis? Are the current approaches to teach people about tuberculosis useful? How effective are the lessons and products provided? Do they change lives? Is CNTC planning to send people all over the world and educate students about tuberculosis? I could be involved in this organization by attending one of their lessons or ordering one of their products, and then spread the word about tuberculosis to even more people via the internet (re-teaching others what I learn from their workshops so that more people will know about this disease). I could be involved by fund raising and donating money to this organization so that they can have more workshops and hand out more free products. We could take their very cool idea and turn it into a non-profitable plan. We could buy or make DVD/books that will educate people more about tuberculosis, and then the money earned here will be put towards tuberculosis research programs and helping those who can’t afford medical cure for tuberculosis. It is like a 3 in one packet; people learn, more research is done, and more people cured.  **Case Study II:** By: //Sam, Angela, and Edwin// The specific topic our group decided to focus on is Tuberculosis, which is a Global Infectious Disease. **Which organization did you choose to focus on and why?** The organization we choose to focus on is TB ALERT, because we feel that this organization is a very efficient and creative group that is passionate about the problems arising in the world because of the disease TB. What particularly interested us is the different approaches they make toward this issue- they not only try finding solutions directly for the eradication of TB, but they also try to 1) stop the obvious discrimination towards TB patients, 2) solve problems such as poverty that may be a cause for a TB outbreak, and even 3) to help get the patients through a tedious 6-9 month treatment period, making them feel better emotionally. We consider all these to be valuable ideas to help relieve the situation, because they aren't so direct, but are very important all the same. Many organizations only focus on either raising money for equipment needed to treat the disease or trying devising medicines and drugs themselves. However, they inevitably leave out other bits of the problem, such as emotional or social aspects. This is a serious flaw, and also a flaw we would have probably made until we came across this group. **What exactly are they doing to try and combat or change your issue?** They of course focus on the education of people about TB. This is mainly raising the awareness of people- telling them how scary or serious a disease like TB could get. The education also emphasizes the importance of completing a standard treatment schedule to fight the bacteria. Also, if they cure the patients, the stops the drug-resistant strains making TB more manageable and so that scientists don't have to find new medication for these super-bugs. Also, they want to help make TB patients feel better to give them the strength to stop Tuberculosis on Earth. **What are some of the things you like about their program?** We like how they are providing mental and emotional support to patients rather than everyday going, "Here's your medicine, make sure you take it all!" as that may discourage the patient thinking that they are unwelcome and unloved in this cruel world, so what's the point? After all, we want to help cure TB related deaths in rural China, therefore it would be completely pointless if they patients lost hope to continue medication. We realized after exploring this group's website that diseases have a huge, influential emotional part as well. **How do you plan to become involved with this organization or model your action plan after it?** We would like to incorporate the organization's mission and ideas with our own. However, we are still set on focusing on raising money. However, if we have time or resources left over, we definitely should and will help TB Patients emotionally in any way we can think of that is achievable by us. We won't be able to answer this question fully until we have all the requirements for this project.
 *  What is the organization?**
 *  What exactly are they doing to try and combat or change your issue?**
 *  What are some of the things you like about their program?**
 *  What are some questions you have about it?**
 *  How could you become involved with this organization or model your action plan after it?**
 * What is the specific topic your group decided to focus on?**

**Articles and Statistics related on Tuberculosis and Bacterium:** [|Tuberculosis FAQs Answered (Center for Disease Control)] [|Even more Tuberculosis FAQs Answered (AVERT HIV and TB)] [|The Man-Made Super-bug (Berkeley University Staff and Students)] [|China and Tuberculosis (WHO)] [|How People Test for Tuberculosis (Wikipedia)] [|What Hospital Superbugs Are and How Lethal They Are (Wikipedia)] [|Green Tea Aids Fight Against Superbug (Not directly related with TB)] [|China has High Amount of Resistant Tuberculosis Bacterium Strains (WORLD NEWS)] [|A Definition for Tuberculosis Mortality (WHO)]

[|A "Calculator" that Shows Specific Statistics of TB-related Occurences by Geographical Areas (WHO)] [|An Easier Form of Statistics Presented to Viewers (Wrong_Diagnosis)] [|A Visual Trend showing how Drug Resistance and Drug-use are related (FDA)]

**Make a list of organizations that people can join to get involved in this issue and petitions that people can sign.** http://www.wiserearth.org/organization/view/edb1123c70cff155f12c3e098f03fe9d http://www.tbalert.org/ http://www.nationaltbcenter.edu/ http://www.who.int/tb/en/ http://www.globalhealthreporting.org/tb.asp?id=71 http://www.lungusa.org/site/pp.asp?c=dvLUK9O0E&b=22542

**Make a list of relevant images, youtubes and videos you have collected on the issue**

media type="youtube" key="3ExuCr1EG2M" height="344" width="425" The video above is a slide show about tuberculosis, it mainly covers what we talked about in our case study but in a very deep and emotional way. This slide show can really open people's mind to developing worlds and tuberculosis, and the music is a great bonus.

NOTE: If we have time, we will certainly make a video very similar to this one, with Angela as an expert in the field and music commissioned for Sam to compose.. media type="youtube" key="149H13ocPqw" height="344" width="425" The video above is very inspirational yet informative. It will most likely inspire millions of viewers to make a change and help with this issue. The video talks about how tuberculosis can kill someone even without them knowing about it. A diagram of a tuberculosis cell, it has a very thick cell membrane. Click on the link for a better picture.

 __[|http://www.kimicontrol.com/microorg/Mycobacterium%20tuberculosis.jpg]__ Close-up of the TB Bacteria. [|http://www.topnews.in/health/files/tuberculosis-cough.jpg] What a severe TB Case would like like with a x-ray. This picture shows how contagious tuberculosis can be, again, use the link for the full image. Another picture showing how tuberculosis is spread Logo for the group TB Alert

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