INTRODUCTION TO

PATHOLOGY
UNIVERSITY OF ZAMBIA
DEPARTMENT OF PHARMACY
Ms. CHISHA, BPHARM
 DEFINITION
• The word ‘Pathology’ is derived from two Greek words;
• Pathos meaning suffering, and logos meaning study.
• Therefore, Pathology is scientific study of structure and function of
the body in disease; or in other words, pathology consists of the
abnormalities that occur in normal anatomy (including histology) and
physiology owing to disease.
• Your practice of as a health practitioner will be as good as your
understanding of pathology;-edited by Ms. Chisha.
 TERMS
• Pathophysiology; patho=suffering, physiology=study of normal
function. Pathophysiology is the study of disordered function or
breakdown of homeostasis in diseases. Pathologists are the
diagnosticians of disease.
• Disease; disease is loss of ease (or comfort) to the body (i.e. dis-ease).
• Health; health may be defined as a condition when the individual is in
complete accord with the surroundings, or "Health is a state of
complete physical, mental and social well-being and
not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.“ WHO.
• Illness; illness is the reaction of the individual to disease in the form
of symptoms (complaints of the patient) and physical signs (elicited
by the clinician).
• The patient is the person affected by the disease.
• Lesions are the characteristic changes in tissues and cells produced by
disease in an individual or experimental animal.
• Etiology is the origin of a disease, including the underlying causes and
modifying factors, (i.e. ‘why’ of disease).
• Pathogenesis refers to the steps in the development of disease or
mechanism of disease development. It describes how etiologic factors
trigger cellular and molecular changes that give rise to the specific
functional and structural abnormalities that characterize the disease,
(i.e. ‘how’ of disease).
• Functional implications of the disease felt by the patient are
symptoms and those discovered by the clinician are the physical signs.
• Diagnosis; what is wrong
• Prognosis; what is going to happen
• Treatment; what can be done about it
• Prevention; what should be done to avoid complications and spread.
• Syndromes (meaning running together) are characterized by a
combination of symptoms caused by altered physiologic processes
without which the disease cannot be recognized or diagnosed.
• Morphological changes; Structural alterations in cells or tissues that
are either characteristic of the disease or diagnostic of the aetiologic
process.
Pathognomonic Abnormalities
• Are restricted to a single disease, or disease category, and without
them, the diagnosis is impossible or uncertain, (E.g. The presence of
HIV, in the appropriate context, is pathognomonic of AIDS).
Complications and Sequelae
• Diseases may have prolonged, secondary, or distant effects.
An aftereffect (secondary effect) of a disease is called a Sequelae.
Remission; Is the process of conversion from active disease to
quiescence.
Relapse; Reappearance of the signs and symptoms
Diagnosis
Is the process of identifying a disease by its signs, symptoms, and
results of various diagnostic procedures.
Diagnosis can be:
Morphological – naming the lesions
Etiological – naming the cause of the disease
Tentative–temporal diagnosis
Differential – list of diseases that have similar signs
Definitive – naming the specific disease entity
TYPES OF PATHOLOGY • Deals with general
principles of disease,(i.e.
General Concerned with the
basic reaction of cells
Pathology and tissues to abnormal
stimuli that underlie all
diseases).

• Systemic Pathology

Systemic includes the study of

diseases of the specific

Pathology
organs and body
systems in light of a
stimuli.
 SUBDIVISIONS OF PATHOLOGY
HISTOPATHOLOGY
• Histopathology is used synonymously with anatomic pathology, pathologic anatomy, or
morbid anatomy, it is the method of study that includes structural changes observed by
naked eye examination referred to as gross or macroscopic changes, and the changes
detected by light and electron microscopy supported by numerous special staining
methods including histochemical and immunological techniques to arrive at the most
accurate diagnosis.

• cardiac pathology, pulmonary pathology, neuropathology, renal pathology, gynecologic

pathology, breast pathology, dermatopathology, gastrointestinal pathology, oral
 Types of histopathology
• Surgical pathology. It deals with the study of tissues removed from the living body

• Forensic pathology and autopsy work. This includes the study of organs and tissues
removed at postmortem for medicolegal work and for determining the underlying
sequence and cause of death. There is forensic and academic or clinical autopsies.

• Cytopathology includes study of cells shed off from the lesions (exfoliative cytology) and
fine-needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) of superficial and deep-seated lesions for
diagnosis
SUBDIVISIONS OF PATHOLOGY Continues
HAEMATOLOGY.
• Hematology deals with the diseases of blood. It includes laboratory
hematology and clinical hematology; the latter covers the
management of patient as well.
CHEMICAL PATHOLOGY
• Analysis of biochemical constituents of blood, urine, semen, CSF and
other body fluids is included in this branch of pathology.
IMMUNOLOGY
• Detection of abnormalities in the immune system of the body
comprises immunology and immunopathology.
SUBDIVISIONS OF PATHOLOGY Continues
EXPERIMENTAL PATHOLOGY
• This is defined as the production of disease in the experimental
animal and its study
GEOGRAPHIC PATHOLOGY
• The study of differences in the distribution of frequency and type of
diseases in populations in different parts of the world forms
geographic pathology, Ebola, Cholera, and Malaria.
SUBDIVISIONS OF PATHOLOGY Continues
MOLECULAR PATHOLOGY
• The detection and diagnosis of abnormalities at the level of DNA of
the cell is included in molecular pathology
MEDICAL GENETICS
• This is the branch of human genetics that deals with the relationship
between heredity and disease, e.g. in blood groups, inborn errors of
metabolism, chromosomal aberrations in congenital malformations
and neoplasms, etc.
 Nomenclature Of Disease
• Uniform nomenclature facilitates communication and enables
accurate epidemiological studies.
• Many standard conventions are used to derive names of diseases. Eg
- Primary and secondary
- Acute and chronic
- Benign and malignant
- Prefixes and suffixes
- Eponymous
 Primary and secondary
• These words may be used to describe the causation of disease.
• Primary or essential or idiopathic or cryptogenic in this context means
that the disease is without evident antecedent cause.
• Thus, primary hypertension is defined as abnormally high blood
pressure without apparent cause.
Acute and chronic
 Benign and malignant
• Terms used to classify certain diseases according to their likely
outcome.
• Benign cancer is a relatively mild growth of a tumor that develops
gradually and causes insidious injury to the organs of the body.
• Malignant cancer is when the cell growth rises rapidly and causes
severe symptoms and tissue injury.
 Prefixes
Commonly used prefixes and their meanings
• Ana – absence e.g. anaphylaxis
• Dys – disordered e.g. dysplasia
• Hyper - an excess over normal e.g. hyperglycemia
• Hypo - a deficiency below normal e.g. hypoglycemia
• Neo – new growth e.g. Neoplasia
• Meta – a change from one state to another e.g. metaplasia
 Suffixes
• Commonly used suffixes and their meanings:
• -itis - an inflammatory process eg appendicitis
• -oma – a tumor eg carcinoma
• -osis – state or condition, not necessarily pathological eg
osteoarthrosis
• -oid – bearing a resemblance to eg rheumatoid arthritis
Suffixes continues………………..
• -cytosis – increased number of cells, usually in blood eg leukocytosis
• -penia – lack of eg thrombocytopenia
• -ectasis – dilation eg bronchiectasis
• -plasia – a disorder of growth eg hyperplasia
• -opathy – an abnormal state lacking specific characteristics eg
lymphadenopathy
 Eponymous Names
• Named after a person or place associated with it eg Graves’ disease,
Ebola, etc.
• They are used commonly either when the nature or cause of the
disease or lesion is unknown, or long-term usage has resulted in the
name becoming part of the language of Medicine e.g. Malaria
• or to commemorate the person who first described the condition eg
Crohn`s disease, Hodgkin`s disease, et
OVERVIEW OF THE
CURRICULUM
PATHOLOGY COURSE OUTLINE