Contraindication in the context of "Estradiol (medication)"

A therapy or medical treatment is the attempted remediation of a health problem, usually following a medical diagnosis. Both words, treatment and therapy, are often abbreviated tx, Tx, or T_x.

As a rule, each therapy has indications and contraindications. There are many different types of therapy. Not all therapies are effective. Many therapies can produce unwanted adverse effects.

In medicine, an indication is a valid reason to use a certain test, medication, procedure, or surgery. There can be multiple indications to use a procedure or medication. An indication can commonly be confused with the term diagnosis. A diagnosis is the assessment that a particular medical condition is present while an indication is a reason for use. The opposite of an indication is a contraindication, a reason to withhold a certain medical treatment because the risks of treatment clearly outweigh the benefits.

In the US, indications for prescription drugs are approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Indications are included in the Indications and Usage section of the Prescribing Information. The primary role of this section of labeling is to enable health care practitioners to readily identify appropriate therapies for patients by clearly communicating the drug's approved indication(s). The Indications and Usage section states the disease or condition, or manifestation or symptoms thereof, for which the drug is approved, as well as whether the drug is indicated for the treatment, prevention, mitigation, cure, relief, or diagnosis of that disease or condition. Additionally, the Indications and Usage section should contain the approved age groups as well as other information necessary to describe appropriate use (for example, identifying the indicated patient/disease subgroups, stating if adjunctive therapy is required).

An adverse effect is an undesired harmful effect resulting from a medication or other intervention, such as surgery. An adverse effect may be termed a "side effect", when judged to be secondary to a main or therapeutic effect. The term complication is similar to adverse effect, but the latter is typically used in pharmacological contexts, or when the negative effect is expected or common. If the negative effect results from an unsuitable or incorrect dosage or procedure, this is called a medical error and not an adverse effect. Adverse effects are sometimes referred to as "iatrogenic" because they are generated by a physician/treatment. Some adverse effects occur only when starting, increasing or discontinuing a treatment.Using a drug or other medical intervention which is contraindicated may increase the risk of adverse effects. Adverse effects may cause complications of a disease or procedure and negatively affect its prognosis. They may also lead to non-compliance with a treatment regimen. Adverse effects of medical treatment resulted in 142,000 deaths in 2013 up from 94,000 deaths in 1990 globally.

The harmful outcome is usually indicated by some result such as morbidity, mortality, alteration in body weight, levels of enzymes, loss of function, or as a pathological change detected at the microscopic, macroscopic or physiological level. It may also be indicated by symptoms reported by a patient. Adverse effects may cause a reversible or irreversible change, including an increase or decrease in the susceptibility of the individual to other chemicals, foods, or procedures, such as drug interactions.

A computed tomography scan (CT scan), formerly called computed axial tomography scan (CAT scan), is a medical imaging technique used to obtain detailed internal images of the body. The personnel that perform CT scans are called radiographers or radiology technologists.CT scanners use a rotating X-ray tube and a row of detectors placed in a gantry to measure X-ray attenuations by different tissues inside the body. The multiple X-ray measurements taken from different angles are then processed on a computer using tomographic reconstruction algorithms to produce tomographic (cross-sectional) images (virtual "slices") of a body. CT scans can be used in patients with metallic implants or pacemakers, for whom magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is contraindicated.

Since its development in the 1970s, CT scanning has proven to be a versatile imaging technique. While CT is most prominently used in medical diagnosis, it can also be used to form images of non-living objects. The 1979 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded jointly to South African-American physicist Allan MacLeod Cormack and British electrical engineer Godfrey Hounsfield "for the development of computer-assisted tomography".