Related Experiment Video
Updated: Dec 23, 2025

An R-Based Landscape Validation of a Competing Risk Model
Published on: September 16, 2022
Relative risks and odds ratios: Simple rules on when and how to use them
Dean P McKenzie1,2, Christopher Thomas1
1Epworth HealthCare, Melbourne, Australia.
Aim:
Relative risks and odds ratios are widely reported in the medical literature, but can be very difficult to understand. We sought to further clarify these important indices.
Methods:
We illustrated both relative risks and odds ratios using bar charts, then looked at the types of study for which each statistic is suited. We demonstrated calculation of relative risks and odds ratios through analysis of tabled data from a recent published longitudinal study, using a 2 × 2 table and R, the open-source statistical programming language. Simple rules for when and how to use relative risks and odds ratios are presented.
Conclusion:
Understanding the difference between relative risks and odds ratios and when and how to use them may aid clinical interpretation, dissemination and translation of research findings.
More Related Videos
Related Concept Videos
Odds Ratio
Relative Risk
Hazard Ratio
For example, in a clinical trial...
Types of Biopharmaceutical Studies: Controlled and Non-Controlled Approaches
Non-controlled studies, commonly employed for initial exploration, lack a control group, rendering them susceptible to biases and external influences. In contrast,...
Testing a Claim about Population Proportion
There are two methods of testing a claim about a population proportion: (1) Using the sample proportion from the data where a binomial distribution is approximated to the normal distribution and (2) Using the binomial probabilities calculated from the data.
The first method uses normal distribution as an approximation to the binomial distribution. The requirements are as follows: sample size is large...
Probability Laws

