title: An ounce of prevention?
abstract: While preventive health care is intuitively attractive, both from a disease morbidity and cost of care aspect, it is most effective when the natural history of a disease can be precisely predicted and when there is effective therapy to modify the risk factor. In contrast, if the natural history is uncertain, perhaps due to its multifactorial nature and treatment not entirely effective, there will inevitably be inefficiency in preventive treatment. In this complicated balancing act, the inefficiencies of preventive therapy may be buried beneath the surface, due in part to the method of reporting and perhaps to the enthusiasm for preventive medicine in general. Until we are able to identify more predictive risk factors, there will always be inefficiencies in preventive medicine, and many must be treated for one to benefit. However, the absolute risk reduction and the number needed to treat are useful measures to highlight what can actually be achieved with preventive therapy.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Brown
mesh_terms: D018672:Community Health Planning; D006293:Health Promotion; D006801:Humans; D006937:Hypercholesterolemia / Q000517:prevention & control; D010024:Osteoporosis / Q000517:prevention & control; D010353:Patient Education as Topic; D011314:Preventive Health Services; D012307:Risk Factors; D014481:United States