MEASURE | ABBREVIATION | HOW TO CALCULATE | ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES IN PATIENT RISK COMMUNICATION | EXAMPLE* (REDUCTION IN LUNG CANCER MORTALITY) |
---|---|---|---|---|
Natural frequency | NF | Number of persons with events in a population |
| 13 of 1000 people died of lung cancer with screening; 16 of 1000 people died from lung cancer without screening. Thus, there were 3 of 1000 fewer deaths from lung cancer with screening |
Absolute risk | AR | The number of events in the screened or control groups divided by the number of people in that group |
| AR in control group = 1.66% AR in screened group = 1.33% |
Absolute risk reduction | ARR | Difference in the event rates between the screened and control arms of the study | ARR = 1.66% − 1.33% = 0.33% | |
Relative risk | RR | Ratio of the outcome measure (eg, overall mortality) in the screened group compared with the unscreened group |
| RR = 0.80 |
Relative risk reduction | RRR | The difference in event rates between the screened and control groups divided by the event rate in the control group |
| RRR = 1.66 − 1.33/1.66 = 0.20 RRR = 20% |
Number needed to screen | NNS | Reciprocal of the ARR |
| NNS = 308† |
↵* All measures describe the same reduction in lung cancer mortality.
↵† Differs slightly from 1/ARR in this example owing to rounding.
All examples are taken from the National Lung Screening Trial.24
Estimates were taken from the Canadian Task Force on Preventive Health Care systematic review and meta-analysis on screening for lung cancer.25,26