Trial reportThe British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners2011
Therapeutic decisions by number needed to treat and survival gains: a cross-sectional survey of lipid-lowering drug recommendations.
Trial report in The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners, 2011. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed, 10 citations in OpenAlex.
- Impact of effectiveness information format on patient choice of therapy and satisfaction with decisions about chronic disease medication: the "Influence of intervention Methodologies on Patient Choice of Therapy (IMPACT)" cluster-randomised trial in general practice.BMC health services research · 2013Trial
- Article
- Personalized prediction of lifetime benefits with statin therapy for asymptomatic individuals: a modeling study.PLoS medicine · 2012Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundPrevious studies suggest that lay people have difficulties with evaluating effect size in terms of number needed to treat (NNT), but they are sensitive to effect size in terms of survival gains.
aimTo explore whether GPs and internists are sensitive to NNT and survival gains when considering a lipid-lowering drug therapy. DESIGN AND
settingCross-sectional survey of primary prevention of cardiovascular disease with random allocation to different scenarios.
methodGPs (n = 450) and internists (n = 450) were posted a vignette presenting a high-risk patient and a novel drug, 'neostatin'. The benefit was described in terms of NNT or mean gain in disease-free survival. Each physician was randomly allocated to one version of the vignette. Outcome measures were evaluation of 'neostatin' on a Likert scale (0: very poor choice, 10: very good choice) and the proportion recommending 'neostatin'.
resultsA total of 477 responses (53%) were received. Among responders to NNT scenarios, 26%, 31%, and 43% recommended 'neostatin' for NNT values of 34, 17, and 9 respectively. With equivalent disease-free survival gains of 9, 17, and 32 months, 40%, 49%, and 52% respectively recommended the drug. On the rating scale, mean values were 4.7, 5.0, and 5.5 across the respective NNT scenarios and 5.2, 6.2, and 6.1 across the scenarios presenting survival gains. Differences in trends between the two formats were not statistically significant. In total, 33% recommended 'neostatin' when presented with NNT values, compared to 47% when presented with survival gain (χ(2) = 9.2, P= 0.002).
conclusionPhysicians presented with survival gains were more likely to recommend the therapy than those presented with NNT. Sensitivity to effect size was similar for both effect formats.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.