What is a Hazard Ratio?

Medical professionals sometimes use the term ‘hazard ratio’ to talk about risk. A hazard ratio considers your absolute risk to be 1. If something you do or take does not change your risk, then the hazard ratio is 1.

Lowering Your Risk

If something you do or take lowers your risk by 30% compared to someone who does not take the same step, then that action makes your hazard ratio 0.70, which means that the risk is 70% of what it was without taking the step (in other words, it is 30% lower).

Increasing Your Risk

If something you do triples your risk, then your hazard ratio is 3.0 (your risk is 3 times greater than it was before you did the thing that increased your risk).

Relative Risk versus Absolute Risk

If you want to learn about, and the difference between, relative risk and absolute risk then look here.