ArticleDrug safety2017
People's Understanding of Verbal Risk Descriptors in Patient Information Leaflets: A Cross-Sectional National Survey of 18- to 65-Year-Olds in England.
Article in Drug safety, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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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
10 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Imprecision and Preferences in Interpretation of Verbal Probabilities in Health: a Systematic Review.Journal of general internal medicine · 2021Pooled it
- A systematic review of factors associated with side-effect expectations from medical interventions.Health expectations : an international journal of public participation in health care and health policy · 2020Pooled it
- Trial
- Where do people obtain side effect information? Results from a census-matched U.S. national survey.Exploratory research in clinical and social pharmacy · 2026Article
- Communication of anticancer drug benefits and related uncertainties to patients and clinicians: document analysis of regulated information on prescription drugs in Europe.BMJ (Clinical research ed.) · 2023Article
- Positive Attribute Framing Increases COVID-19 Booster Vaccine Intention for Unfamiliar Vaccines.Vaccines · 2022Article
- Are Older People Aware of Potential Risks Related to Benzodiazepines They are Taking and Has Anything Changed in Risk Awareness Over Ten Years?Patient preference and adherence · 2021Article
- Article
- Factors that Facilitate and Hinder the Comprehension of Patient Information Leaflets (PILs): A Brief Scoping Review.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2021Article
- The Unintended Consequences of Adverse Event Information on Medicines' Risks and Label Content.Pharmaceutical medicine · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
introductionEvidence suggests the current verbal risk descriptors used to communicate side effect risk in patient information leaflets (PILs) are overestimated.
objectivesThe aim was to establish how people understand the verbal risk descriptors recommended for use in PILs by the European Commission (EC), and alternative verbal risk descriptors, in the context of mild and severe side effects.
methodsA cross-sectional online survey was carried out by a market research company recruiting participants aged between 18 and 65 years living in England. Data were collected between 18 March and 1 April 2016. Participants were given a hypothetical scenario regarding the risk of mild or severe medication side effects and asked to estimate how many out of 10,000 people would be affected for each of the verbal risk descriptors being tested.
resultsA total of 1003 participants were included in the final sample. The risks conveyed by the EC recommended verbal risk descriptors were greatly overestimated by participants. Two distinct distributions were apparent for participant estimates of side effect risks: those for 'high risk' verbal descriptors (e.g. 'common', 'likely', 'high chance') and those for 'low risk' verbal descriptors (e.g. 'uncommon', 'unlikely', 'low chance'). Within these two groups, the distributions were near to identical regardless of what adverb (e.g. very, high, fair) or adjective (e.g. common, likely, chance) was used. The EC recommended verbal risk descriptors were more likely to be understood in accordance with their intended meanings when describing severe side effects. Very few demographic or psychological factors were consistently associated with how well participants understood the EC recommended verbal risk descriptors. DISCUSSION: The current verbal risk descriptors used in PILs are ineffective at best and misleading at worst. Discontinuing the use of verbal risk descriptors would limit the likelihood of people overestimating the risk of side effects.
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