[Let's stop using packet-years as expression of tobacco consumption].
It has become standard practice to describe the consumption of cigarettes by the number of "pack-years" obtained by multiplying number of packs per day by number of years. This leads conveniently to a single number summarising the overall tobacco consumption of an individual. Unfortunately, this summary is not relevant to the study of the effect of tobacco on health since it assumes identical effects of dose and duration, when the effect of duration is much larger than the effect of dose. If tobacco consumption must be summarised by a single number, the relevant figure is the duration of exposure to tobacco, ignoring the dose.
Hill
C
C
D001984:Bronchial Neoplasms / Q000209:etiology; D006801:Humans; D012307:Risk Factors; D012907:Smoking / Q000009:adverse effects; D013997:Time Factors
Pour en finir avec les paquets-années comme expression de la consommation tabagique.