The use of the personalized estimate of death probabilities for medical decision making

Data coming from the French national statistics on the cause of deaths are used to calculate the probabilities of death from pathologies. These probab ilities are calculated according to age, sex, and place of residence of the patient to "personalize" the estimate. This individual prediction of the r isk of death is proposed for pathologies for which the feasibility and the utility of prevention measures had been demonstrated. Relative risks of dea th according to the socioprofessional category, which are coming from the s cientific literature, are used to adjust the probabilities of death as a fu nction of the patient socioprofessional category. The aim of this work is t o guide a scientist toward a prevention strategy according to the age and c haracteristics of patient. The use of computers by the scientists will make possible the diffusion of such tool of prediction to improve a personalize d prevention. (C) 2000 Academic Press.