pack-year

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

Compound of pack +‎ year, although, as with any such unit of measure (e.g., person-months, newton metres), the mathematical relationship of multiplication is simultaneously involved: X packs per day smoked during Y years = X × Y = Z pack-years.

Noun

pack-year (plural pack-years)

  1. (medicine, smoking) A unit for estimating the number of cigarettes a person has smoked previously; it is calculated by multiplying the average number of packs (each containing 20 cigarettes) the person smokes per day by the number of years the person has smoked.

Synonyms

  • PY, py (initialisms)

Translations

See also

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