Acute and Chronic Diseases

Meaning of Acute and Chronic Disease

Throughout recorded history, diseases have been classified by different means and classification schemes. What we now think of as acute and chronic diseases have been documented by the primitive hunter-gatherers of 10,000 years ago and in ancient civilizations from 6,000 years ago in Egypt, Mesopotamia, and the Indus Valley. The etymologic basis for the words acute and chronic is from the Latin. The word acute originates from the Latin acutus, meaning sharp or to sharpen. Over the years, the term has been applied to disease states and has taken on three parameters: conditions (1) of short duration, (2) of rapid onset, and (3) of severity. In contrast, the word chronic is derived from the Latin chronicus and means continuous or constant. Chronic diseases are conditions that are of long duration, slow onset, and less severity. Some expectations of chronic diseases are that they cannot be cured and they do not spontaneously resolve or disappear.

The early designation of a disease as acute or chronic was based on its duration. Although no actual time frame was designated, one thought of acute disease in terms of days or weeks, whereas chronic disease was thought of as lasting months, years, or for an entire lifetime. The National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) now uses 3 months as the dividing line. Acute diseases are conditions lasting less than 3 months, while chronic diseases are conditions lasting for more than 3 months. However, it is important to note that the terms acute and chronic disease, and their use, vary in medicine and public health.

There is also a wide range of definitions of the words acute and chronic, depending on the audience questioned. For example, if you ask people in the general public what terms come to mind when you say the words acute and chronic, for acute they frequently say acute angle, acute shortage, acute sense of smell; and for chronic they say chronic complainer and chronically late. If you ask people in healthcare and public health what terms come to mind when you say acute disease, they say acute abdomen, acute pain, and acute respiratory disease; and for chronic disease they say chronic cholecystitis, diabetes, and cancer.

...