Samuel Wiebe's question "What is the clinical question?" has reminded me of
a big argument against quoting events per patient-years in some situations.
the reasoning comes not from statistics but from clinical considerations,for
which i am grateful to sam for bringing up.
events per patient-years assumes that the event rate remains constant over
time but this is simply not true for many chronic conditions. we know from
pathophysiology that arteriopathy is a progressive disorder so 1000
hypertensive patients are unlikely to have the same number of events over 1
year as 100 patients are over 10 years.
--
Kev Hopayian, Seahills, Leiston Rd, Aldeburgh, Suffolk IP15 5PL, England
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