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What Is The Number Needed To Treat When Exercise Training Heart Failure Patients?, Neil Smart

Neil Smart

Debate exists on the number needed to treat (NNT) to prevent one mortality with exercise training in heart failure patients. The primary aim of this work was to conduct a sensitivity analysis, removing outlying mortality data from a published meta-analysis of exercise training in heart failure patients. A sensitivity analysis was conducted by removing data from one randomized controlled trial that reported particularly high mortality rates and may be considered a data outlier. Annualized NNTs were subsequently calculated for mortality data from a meta-analysis of exercise training in heart failure patients. Sensitivity analysis showed that the mortality benefit reported by …