NR222 Assignment: Shingles: Herpes Zoster Virus in Older Adults - Over Age 65

Shingles: Healthy people.
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Shingles in Adults
Every year there has been new cases of shingles in the United States. Adults have a high risk of up to 95% of getting shingles and this risk rises after 50 years of age (CDC, 2016). In every group of three people, within the United States, one of them will develop shingles at one time in their lifetime. Shingles is also known as Zoster or in other words herpes zoster (CDC, 2016). In American alone there is an estimated one million cases of the disease annually. While the disease can affect anyone including children, it is the older adults that are at a higher risk of developing the disease. It is a disease that largely caused by the Varicella zoster virus ("Shingles-Topic Overview", 2016). Further studies shows that 60% of women are associated with shingles and 40% for men (Kawai, Gebremeskel, & Acosta, 2014). This research is therefore aimed at identifying the possible approaches that can help reduce the spread of shingles in adults and measures that the medical authority can implement in the campaign for better healthy living among the people.
In a research by Tae Joon Lee, MD, CMD, Stella Hayes, MD, Doyle M. Cummings, PharmD, Qing Cao, MD, Kristin Carpenter, Leah Heim and Hollie Edwards, in which they evaluate the knowledge, prevalence and the vaccination rates by race, reveals some intriguing elements (Joon Lee et al., 2013). The survey evaluated participants in three university based primary clinics, where patients who were more than 60 years of age were involved (Joon Lee et al., 2013). The participants gave information on their history with shingles, age, sex, race and level of education. From the study which had 403 participants of which 49% were African Americans and 47% were white, it was established that the prevalence of the disease among this po...