Journal club: SELECT, absolute risk, and how it was reported — a second dataset

On the subject in the title: Journal club: SELECT, absolute risk, and how it was reported — a second dataset Working notes rather than a conclusion.

Posting a small dataset on SELECT. It is mine, it is uncontrolled, and the method is stated so it can be discounted appropriately.

What I would like is not agreement but a second dataset collected by someone with no stake in mine. If one exists I would rather read it than argue for this one.

Where the SELECT discussion usually stalls is that nobody wants to say "I do not know" and everyone is willing to say "it varies". Those are the same sentence with different clothes on.

SELECT (N Engl J Med 2023): Semaglutide cardiovascular outcomes without diabetes. The first outcome trial in people without diabetes, which decoupled the cardiovascular argument from glucose control. Read the absolute numbers, not just the relative reduction.

The opening post and I disagree about the size of the effect, not about the direction.

An hour is enough for one paper read properly and not enough for two read partly. The temptation is always to add the second.

Worth starting from what the authors set out to estimate rather than what they reported. Half the disagreements in a session dissolve once that is stated explicitly.

That is the honest state of it as of this week.