Dataset Information

Statistical methods for analyzing right-censored length-biased data under cox model.

ABSTRACT: Length-biased time-to-event data are commonly encountered in applications ranging from epidemiological cohort studies or cancer prevention trials to studies of labor economy. A longstanding statistical problem is how to assess the association of risk factors with survival in the target population given the observed length-biased data. In this article, we demonstrate how to estimate these effects under the semiparametric Cox proportional hazards model. The structure of the Cox model is changed under length-biased sampling in general. Although the existing partial likelihood approach for left-truncated data can be used to estimate covariate effects, it may not be efficient for analyzing length-biased data. We propose two estimating equation approaches for estimating the covariate coefficients under the Cox model. We use the modern stochastic process and martingale theory to develop the asymptotic properties of the estimators. We evaluate the empirical performance and efficiency of the two methods through extensive simulation studies. We use data from a dementia study to illustrate the proposed methodology, and demonstrate the computational algorithms for point estimates, which can be directly linked to the existing functions in S-PLUS or R.

SUBMITTER: Qin J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3035941 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Statistical methods for analyzing right-censored length-biased data under cox model.

Qin Jing J Shen Yu Y

Biometrics 20090612 2

Length-biased time-to-event data are commonly encountered in applications ranging from epidemiological cohort studies or cancer prevention trials to studies of labor economy. A longstanding statistical problem is how to assess the association of risk factors with survival in the target population given the observed length-biased data. In this article, we demonstrate how to estimate these effects under the semiparametric Cox proportional hazards model. The structure of the Cox model is changed un ...[more]

PMID: 19522872

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Project description:The National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) is conducting an epidemiologic study (GuLF STUDY) to investigate the health of the workers and volunteers who participated from April to December of 2010 in the response and cleanup of the oil release after the Deepwater Horizon explosion in the Gulf of Mexico. The exposure assessment component of the study involves analyzing thousands of personal monitoring measurements that were collected during this effort. A substantial portion of these data has values reported by the analytic laboratories to be below the limits of detection (LOD). A simulation study was conducted to evaluate three established methods for analyzing data with censored observations to estimate the arithmetic mean (AM), geometric mean (GM), geometric standard deviation (GSD), and the 95th percentile (X0.95) of the exposure distribution: the maximum likelihood (ML) estimation, the β-substitution, and the Kaplan-Meier (K-M) methods. Each method was challenged with computer-generated exposure datasets drawn from lognormal and mixed lognormal distributions with sample sizes (N) varying from 5 to 100, GSDs ranging from 2 to 5, and censoring levels ranging from 10 to 90%, with single and multiple LODs. Using relative bias and relative root mean squared error (rMSE) as the evaluation metrics, the β-substitution method generally performed as well or better than the ML and K-M methods in most simulated lognormal and mixed lognormal distribution conditions. The ML method was suitable for large sample sizes (N ≥ 30) up to 80% censoring for lognormal distributions with small variability (GSD = 2-3). The K-M method generally provided accurate estimates of the AM when the censoring was <50% for lognormal and mixed distributions. The accuracy and precision of all methods decreased under high variability (GSD = 4 and 5) and small to moderate sample sizes (N < 20) but the β-substitution was still the best of the three methods. When using the ML method, practitioners are cautioned to be aware of different ways of estimating the AM as they could lead to biased interpretation. A limitation of the β-substitution method is the absence of a confidence interval for the estimate. More research is needed to develop methods that could improve the estimation accuracy for small sample sizes and high percent censored data and also provide uncertainty intervals.

Dataset Information

Statistical methods for analyzing right-censored length-biased data under cox model.

Publications

Statistical methods for analyzing right-censored length-biased data under cox model.

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