BPS 1101 Chapter Notes - Chapter 1-4: Relative Risk, Statistical Literacy, Overdiagnosis

• School: University of Ottawa
• Department: Biopharmaceutical sciences
• Course: BPS 1101
• Professor: William Ogilvie

Document Summary

Statistical thinking how to understand information about risks and uncertainties. The way they present medicine is wrong and confusing for people. They need to communicate risks in more easily understood forms. Before treatment was based on ethic of personal trust as opposed to quantitative facts. Without understanding the numbers, citizens are susceptible to political and commercial manipulation. To boost statistical literacy we should introduce kids to statistical thinking and teach them statistics in school. People need to understand the difference between absolute risks and relative risks and how to use natural frequencies to infer the true chance of disease from a positive test result. Absolute risks probability or chance of an event. More informative take into account information about background rates. Relative risk can be derived from the absolute risk but not vice versa. Relative risks probability of an outcome in an exposed group to a probability in an outcome of an unexposed group.