1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910136014203321

Autore

Everitt Brian S

Titolo

Health and Lifestyle : Separating the Truth from the Myth with Statistics / / by Brian S. Everitt

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Cham : , : Springer International Publishing : , : Imprint : Copernicus, , 2016

ISBN

3-319-42565-X

Edizione

[1st ed. 2016.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (XVI, 155 p. 3 illus., 1 illus. in color.)

Disciplina

519.5

Soggetti

Statistics

Medicine

Health

Biometry

Epidemiology

Popular Science in Statistics

Popular Science in Medicine and Health

Statistics for Life Sciences, Medicine, Health Sciences

Biostatistics

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references at the end of each chapters.

Nota di contenuto

Some Medical History, a Little Statistics and a Very Small Dose of Genetics -- Treatments Good, Bad and Indifferent and How do we Tell? The Randomized Clinical Trial -- Will Drinking Too Much Coffee Result in a Heart Attack? Risk Factors and Health -- Let’s Talk About Cancer -- Food, Weight and Lifestyle: Is Eating too Much and Moving too Little Bad for Your Health?- Alternative Therapies; Magic, Miracles and Delusions -- Epilogue.

Sommario/riassunto

The main message of this book is that people should be on their guard against both scare stories about risks to health, and claims for miracle cures of medical conditions. In the 21st century hardly a day passes without another article appearing in the media about a new treatment for a particular disease, new ways of improving our health by changing our lifestyle or new foodstuffs that claim to increase (or decrease) the risk of heart disease, cancer and the like. But how should the general



public react to such claims, given that some of the journalists writing them focus on the sensational rather than the mundane and often have no qualms about sacrificing accuracy and honesty for the sake of a good story? Perhaps the wisest initial response is one of healthy scepticism, followed by an attempt to discover more about the details of the studies behind the reports. But most people are not, and have little desire to become experts in health research. By reading this book, however, these non-experts can, with minimal effort, learn enough about the scientific method to differentiate between those health claims, warnings and lifestyle recommendations that have some merit and those that are unproven or simply dishonest. So if you want to know if ginseng can really help with your erectile dysfunction, if breast cancer screening is all that politicians claim it to be, if ECT for depression is really a horror treatment and should be banned, if using a mobile phone can lead to brain tumours and how to properly evaluate the evidence from health and lifestyle related studies, then this is the book for you.