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John A. Baron, MD; E. Robert Greenberg, MD
Norris Cotton Cancer Center Hanover, NH 03756

Arch Neurol. 1987;44(11):1110-1111.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

To the Editor.

—In their article in the August 1986 issue of the ARCHIVES, Golbe et al assessed the previously reported inverse association between cigarette smoking and Parkinson's disease (PD) by comparing the average age at onset of symptoms in smokers and nonsmokers with PD.¹ They found that the age at onset was not older among smokers, and from this they concluded that smoking probably does not prevent, delay, or ameliorate PD. The underlying assumption in their study, however, represents a fallacy in statistical reasoning. One cannot draw any inferences by comparing the average age at disease onset for smoking cases and nonsmoking cases unless one also knows the age distribution of the populations of smokers and nonsmokers. If, for example, an investigator compared the average age at PD onset for married and widowed patients, he almost certainly would find that . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

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