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Comparison of two statistical indicators in communicating epidemiological results to the population: a randomized study in a high environmental risk area of Italy

BACKGROUND: When communicating risks to the general population, the format of the epidemiological results may affect individual reactions. In environmental epidemiology, no study has compared the use of different statistical formats in communicating results to the population. The aim of this paper i...

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Autores principales: Baccini, Michela, Ghirardi, Laura, Farinella, Domenica, Biggeri, Annibale
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6560769/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31186020
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-019-7003-y
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author Baccini, Michela
Ghirardi, Laura
Farinella, Domenica
Biggeri, Annibale
author_facet Baccini, Michela
Ghirardi, Laura
Farinella, Domenica
Biggeri, Annibale
author_sort Baccini, Michela
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: When communicating risks to the general population, the format of the epidemiological results may affect individual reactions. In environmental epidemiology, no study has compared the use of different statistical formats in communicating results to the population. The aim of this paper is to investigate whether the degree of concern expressed by residents of a high environmental risk site, regarding epidemiological results on cancer mortality in the area where they live, is influenced by the statistical indicator used in communication. METHODS: A sample of residents in the high environmental risk area of Livorno (Italy) was randomized to respond to different questionnaires, in which the same epidemiological results were expressed by two alternative risk indexes: percent excess risk and time needed to harm, defined as the number of days that one has to wait for, on average, to observe 1 death in excess in respect to the baseline. Participants were asked to express their concern on a quantitative scale or to rank different diseases according to their impressions. The statistical analysis was performed using an Inverse Probability of Treatment Weighting approach based on propensity score, in order to account for sample stratification and adjust for unbalance between groups occurring despite randomization. RESULTS: The probability of high concern levels was larger under time needed to harm than under percent excess, with a difference between proportions of 6.7% (95% Confidence Interval, 0.6,12.8%). Mortality from sexual glands cancer was ranked as more worrisome and mortality from thyroid gland cancer as less worrisome under time needed to harm than under percent excess. No rank change was found for lung cancer. Larger differences between the two indicators arose in subjects with higher education or better numerical skills. CONCLUSIONS: Communicating epidemiological results to the population is not a neutral task. The degree of concern and judgments when comparing results on different diseases may depend on the risk indicators used. Translating scientific results into lay language should not exempt from careful evaluation of the impact of this translation on lay people. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12889-019-7003-y) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
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spelling pubmed-65607692019-06-14 Comparison of two statistical indicators in communicating epidemiological results to the population: a randomized study in a high environmental risk area of Italy Baccini, Michela Ghirardi, Laura Farinella, Domenica Biggeri, Annibale BMC Public Health Research Article BACKGROUND: When communicating risks to the general population, the format of the epidemiological results may affect individual reactions. In environmental epidemiology, no study has compared the use of different statistical formats in communicating results to the population. The aim of this paper is to investigate whether the degree of concern expressed by residents of a high environmental risk site, regarding epidemiological results on cancer mortality in the area where they live, is influenced by the statistical indicator used in communication. METHODS: A sample of residents in the high environmental risk area of Livorno (Italy) was randomized to respond to different questionnaires, in which the same epidemiological results were expressed by two alternative risk indexes: percent excess risk and time needed to harm, defined as the number of days that one has to wait for, on average, to observe 1 death in excess in respect to the baseline. Participants were asked to express their concern on a quantitative scale or to rank different diseases according to their impressions. The statistical analysis was performed using an Inverse Probability of Treatment Weighting approach based on propensity score, in order to account for sample stratification and adjust for unbalance between groups occurring despite randomization. RESULTS: The probability of high concern levels was larger under time needed to harm than under percent excess, with a difference between proportions of 6.7% (95% Confidence Interval, 0.6,12.8%). Mortality from sexual glands cancer was ranked as more worrisome and mortality from thyroid gland cancer as less worrisome under time needed to harm than under percent excess. No rank change was found for lung cancer. Larger differences between the two indicators arose in subjects with higher education or better numerical skills. CONCLUSIONS: Communicating epidemiological results to the population is not a neutral task. The degree of concern and judgments when comparing results on different diseases may depend on the risk indicators used. Translating scientific results into lay language should not exempt from careful evaluation of the impact of this translation on lay people. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12889-019-7003-y) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. BioMed Central 2019-06-11 /pmc/articles/PMC6560769/ /pubmed/31186020 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-019-7003-y Text en © The Author(s). 2019 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.
spellingShingle Research Article
Baccini, Michela
Ghirardi, Laura
Farinella, Domenica
Biggeri, Annibale
Comparison of two statistical indicators in communicating epidemiological results to the population: a randomized study in a high environmental risk area of Italy
title Comparison of two statistical indicators in communicating epidemiological results to the population: a randomized study in a high environmental risk area of Italy
title_full Comparison of two statistical indicators in communicating epidemiological results to the population: a randomized study in a high environmental risk area of Italy
title_fullStr Comparison of two statistical indicators in communicating epidemiological results to the population: a randomized study in a high environmental risk area of Italy
title_full_unstemmed Comparison of two statistical indicators in communicating epidemiological results to the population: a randomized study in a high environmental risk area of Italy
title_short Comparison of two statistical indicators in communicating epidemiological results to the population: a randomized study in a high environmental risk area of Italy
title_sort comparison of two statistical indicators in communicating epidemiological results to the population: a randomized study in a high environmental risk area of italy
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6560769/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31186020
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-019-7003-y
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