PharmacoVig_BOS said:

For anyone reading later: the numbers in this thread are worth checking against a primary source before you act on them, including mine.

Correct as far as it goes. The part it does not cover is what to do when the honest answer is "not enough data", which is more often than anyone likes.

PharmacoVig_BOS said:

For anyone reading later: the numbers in this thread are worth checking against a primary source before you act on them, including mine.

That reframing is the part I needed. Taking it to my next appointment.

Adding the clinical framing, because it changes how the question reads. Whatever the answer turns out to be, the method for getting there is the same: state the assumption, do the arithmetic in public, and invite the correction. That is slower than asserting, and it is the only version that survives being wrong.

Dr.RheumBOS said:

Whatever the answer turns out to be, the method for getting there is the same: state the assumption, do the arithmetic in public, and invite the…

Adding a me-too, because a thread of one person's experience is not much use. I had assumed I was the exception until I read this.

Dr.RheumBOS said:

Whatever the answer turns out to be, the method for getting there is the same: state the assumption, do the arithmetic in public, and invite the…

Adding the part of the answer the thread has not reached. The honest answer is that the effect is real, the magnitude is contested, and the individual variation is larger than either. Those three things can all be true at once, and most arguments here are two people holding different parts of that.