Making sense of risk information on the web

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Abstract
Clarity Clarity means knowing what specific risk is under consideration (is this about getting or dying of the disease?), a number (the probability), and the time period associated with that numbe. Just being told that his risk is above average does not tell Mr Jones the chance that he will get or die of prostate cancer in some defined time frame. A limited number of calculators are available that can generate quantitative risk estimates for various diseases such as breast cancer in the next five years,1 lung cancer in the next 10 years,2 or the combined chance of myocardial infarction or death over 10 years.3 Most, however, calculate only the chance of developing a specific disease, not the chance of dying from it. The US federal government's surveillance, epidemiology, and end results (SEER, http://seer.cancer.gov/) site provides look-up tables and an interactive calculator for estimating the risk of both getting and dying of most cancers.4 Its disadvantage is that the output can be tailored only to age, sex, and race. Its advantages are the broad array of cancers included and flexibility in specifying the time frame. Together Mr Jones and his doctor learn that over the next 10 years a 55 year old white American man's chance of getting prostate cancer is about 40 in 1000 whereas his chance of dying of it is 2 in 1000. Footnotes Competing interests SW and LS none declared. AE is employed by BMJ Knowledge, which owns the BestTreatments website.

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