Department of Infectious and Tropical Disease, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and Hospital for Tropical Diseases, London, UK.
J Travel Med. 2010 May-Jun;17(3):153-62. doi: 10.1111/j.1708-8305.2010.00398.x.
Travel-associated health risks need to be balanced against the positive opportunities associated with interregional travel. As the perceived and real spectrum of health risks related to international travel increase both quantitatively and qualitatively, the need for more discriminating tools in clinical assessment for the purpose of mitigation, public health management, and research are needed. One group of international travelers identified as having increased risk of poor travel-related health outcomes are those who travel with the specific intent of visiting friends or relatives (VFR travelers). Due to variations in defining VFR travel in the health context there are issues in applying this designation uniformly from multiple perspectives. This article supports the standardization of VFR traveler definitions based on objective criteria and provides illustrations of the application of this definition through an illustrated approach to risk assessment based on these criteria and the differentials in the determinants of health between source and destination regions.
A working group was established by the Migration Health Sub-committee, International Society for Travel Medicine to assess the literature on VFR travel and health, review an evidence-based approach to managing health risk related to travel, and to propose criteria-based definition for VFR travel. The new definition of a VFR is a traveler whose primary purpose of travel is to visit friends or relatives where there is a gradient of epidemiological risk between home and destination.
A case scenario discussion of VFR travel defined by criteria and risk assessment based on differential determinants of health is presented in this article.
The goal of this article is to encourage discussion on travel health evaluation for the most "at risk" populations and to standardize the application of clinical, public health, and research approaches to defining VFR travelers in a risk management context.
需要权衡与区域间旅行相关的积极机会与旅行相关的健康风险。随着与国际旅行相关的健康风险的感知和实际范围在数量和质量上都有所增加，需要更具辨别力的临床评估工具来进行缓解、公共卫生管理和研究。一组被认为旅行相关健康结果较差风险增加的国际旅行者是那些有特定目的去拜访朋友或亲戚的旅行者（探亲旅行者）。由于在健康背景下定义探亲旅行存在差异，因此从多个角度统一应用此指定存在问题。本文支持基于客观标准的探亲旅行者定义的标准化，并通过基于这些标准和源地区和目的地之间健康决定因素差异的风险评估示意图来展示该定义的应用，为探亲旅行者定义提供例证。
移民健康小组委员会、国际旅行医学学会成立了一个工作组，评估有关探亲旅行和健康的文献，审查与旅行相关的健康风险管理的循证方法，并提出基于标准的探亲旅行定义。探亲旅行的新定义是指旅行的主要目的是探亲访友，并且在家和目的地之间存在流行病学风险梯度的旅行者。
本文提出了一个基于标准和基于健康决定因素差异的风险评估来定义探亲旅行的案例讨论。
本文的目的是鼓励对最“高风险”人群的旅行健康评估进行讨论，并在风险管理背景下标准化应用临床、公共卫生和研究方法来定义探亲旅行者。
