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Do people with essential tremor (ET) really have the same mortality rate as the general population, as has always been assumed? Louis and colleagues carefully evaluated this assumption in a population-based, prospective study in Spain of 3538 individuals who were at least 65 years old, 201 of whom proved to have ET.
During a 3-year period, 16.4% of those with ET and 13.9% of the controls died. In statistical analyses that controlled for numerous variables, the relative risk for mortality with ET was 1.45. The RR was slightly higher for men with ET and for those with familial ET. In an analysis restricted to patients and controls with follow-up longer than 3 years, the difference was even more pronounced (RR, 4.69). Pneumonia accounted for 6.…