DermHelpCentral

Unnecessary MRIs

There was an important article in the NY Times on the overuse of MRIs in diagnosing sports injuries.  See: Sports Medicine Said to Overuse MRIs.  If you read this, it may save you time, money and unnecessary surgery!

Relative Risk and Absolute Risk

This is an important concept to understand when considering your chance of contracting a disease, getting benefit from a procedure or drug, suffering a side-effect or surviving monster surf at Waimea Bay..

What are absolute and relative risks?

Absolute risk of a disease is your risk of developing the disease over a time-period. We all have absolute risks of developing various diseases such as heart disease, cancer, stroke, etc. The same absolute risk can be expressed in different ways. For example, say you have a 1 in 10 risk of developing a certain disease in your life. This can also be said a 10% risk, or a 0.1 risk - depending if you use percentages or decimals.
Relative risk is used to compare the risk in two different groups of people. For example, the groups could be 'smokers' and 'non-smokers'. All sorts of groups are compared to others in medical research to see if belonging to a group increases or decreases your risk of developing certain diseases. For example, research has shown that smokers have a higher risk of developing heart disease compared to (relative to) non-smokers.

Here's a concise but lucid discussion: Download Risk A:R.