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Glossary

Selected words and phrases

specificity – when referring to the accuracy of a test result, specificity refers to the proportion of people who do not have an illness or disease who have a negative test result.

If a test has low specificity, the concern is over false-positive results – where people who to not have a condition are wrongly diagnosed as having it.

If a test has high specificity, then people who to not have a condition are correctly ruled out from the condition.

For a serious condition, high specificity is essential to prevent people being unnecessarily treated.

Online calculator.

See sensitivity.

carcinoma – cancer in tissues covering or lining organs of the body, such as the skin, the uterus, the lung, or the breast.

stage (staging) – the stage of hepatitis infection refers to the amount of scaring (fibrosis), from results from a biposy. It is usually measured on the Metavir scale of 0 to 4, where 0 represents no scarring and 4 cirrhosis, or on the Knodell scale of 0 to 6, where 0 is no scarring and 6 cirrhosis. See grading.

bradycardia is when the heart beats too slowly.

tachycardia refers to when the heart beats too fast.

See: arrhythmia

weight loss – a general reduction in weight. Weight loss can often be a symptom of other opportunistic infections.

Weight loss and wasting section of the training manual.