4. An article about a study of the effects of aspirin on the risk of heart attack was in the front-page of the New York Times on Jan 27, 1988 (see image on the left). You can check the full arti- cle...

Extracted text: 4. An article about a study of the effects of aspirin on the risk of heart attack was in the front-page of the New York Times on Jan 27, 1988 (see image on the left). You can check the full arti- cle here. The study involved more than 20,000 physicians; from those, 11,037 received aspirin, while 11,034 received a placebo (a fake drug with no effect). Among those who received aspirin, there were 119 heart attacks, whereas for the people on placebo there were 98 heart attacks. Treatment Heart Attack No Heart Attack Aspirin Placebo 119 10918 98 10936 What was the chance of having a heart attack in each of the groups?


Extracted text: Study Finds Benefit of Tablet Every Other. Day Is Much Greater Than Expected Ву HAROLD M.SCHMECK Jr. A major nationwide study shows that a single aspirin tablet every other day can sharply reduce a man's risk of heart auack and death from heart at- tack. The lifesaving effects were so dra- matic that the study was halted in mid- December so that the results could be reported as soon as possible to the par- |ticipants and to the medical profession in general. The magnitude of the beneficial ef- fect was far greater than expected, Dr. Charles H. Hennekens of Harvard, principal investigator in the research, said in a telephone interview. The risk of myocardial infarction, the technical name for heart attack, was cut aimosi in half. 'Extreme Beneficial Effect A special report said the results showed "a statistically extreme benefi- ciał effect" from the use of aspirin. The report is to be published Thursday in The New England Journal of Medicine. In recent years smaller studies have demonstrated that a person who has had one heart attack can reduce the risk of a second by taking aspirin, but there had been no proof that the benefi- cial effect would extend to the genera! male population. Dr. Claude Lenfant, the director of the National Heart Lung and Blood In- stitute, said the findings were "ex- tremely important," but he said the general public should not take the re- port as an indication that everyone should start taking aspirin.