Clinical effective rate (composite responder rate)

Method

Proportion of participants meeting a trial-defined composite threshold for clinical effectiveness — typically a stated percentage improvement in a symptom score or event count, graded cured / markedly effective / effective / ineffective and dichotomised at effective — pooled as a risk ratio. The constituent definition is recorded on the edge and varies between trials.

The method is part of the endpoint identity. Studies measuring the same quantity by a different method are held as separate endpoints.

Notes

SIGN INVERSION against the adverse-event, recurrence, and incidence proportions reported from the very same trials: all are binary proportions expressed as risk ratios, but this one improves by RISING and those improve by FALLING, so a unit-based match reverses the finding. The deeper hazard is that the effectiveness threshold is not standardised, so this node aggregates non-identical definitions and its pooled estimate is only as meaningful as the constituent criteria; it is not a validated responder criterion like ACR20 or a 50% depression-scale reduction and must not be pooled with one.