Utility of inverse probability weighting in molecular pathological epidemiology.

Eur J Epidemiol
Authors
Keywords
Abstract

As one of causal inference methodologies, the inverse probability weighting (IPW) method has been utilized to address confounding and account for missing data when subjects with missing data cannot be included in a primary analysis. The transdisciplinary field of molecular pathological epidemiology (MPE) integrates molecular pathological and epidemiological methods, and takes advantages of improved understanding of pathogenesis to generate stronger biological evidence of causality and optimize strategies for precision medicine and prevention. Disease subtyping based on biomarker analysis of biospecimens is essential in MPE research. However, there are nearly always cases that lack subtype information due to the unavailability or insufficiency of biospecimens. To address this missing subtype data issue, we incorporated inverse probability weights into Cox proportional cause-specific hazards regression. The weight was inverse of the probability of biomarker data availability estimated based on a model for biomarker data availability status. The strategy was illustrated in two example studies; each assessed alcohol intake or family history of colorectal cancer in relation to the risk of developing colorectal carcinoma subtypes classified by tumor microsatellite instability (MSI) status, using a prospective cohort study, the Nurses' Health Study. Logistic regression was used to estimate the probability of MSI data availability for each cancer case with covariates of clinical features and family history of colorectal cancer. This application of IPW can reduce selection bias caused by nonrandom variation in biospecimen data availability. The integration of causal inference methods into the MPE approach will likely have substantial potentials to advance the field of epidemiology.

Year of Publication
2018
Journal
Eur J Epidemiol
Volume
33
Issue
4
Pages
381-392
Date Published
2018 04
ISSN
1573-7284
DOI
10.1007/s10654-017-0346-8
PubMed ID
29264788
PubMed Central ID
PMC5948129
Links
Grant list
R35 CA197735 / CA / NCI NIH HHS / United States
UM1 CA186107 / NH / NIH HHS / United States
K24 DK098311 / NH / NIH HHS / United States
R01 CA137178 / NH / NIH HHS / United States
P01 CA087969 / CA / NCI NIH HHS / United States
R01 CA151993 / CA / NCI NIH HHS / United States
P01 CA87969 / NH / NIH HHS / United States
R01 CA151993 / NH / NIH HHS / United States
R35 CA197735 / NH / NIH HHS / United States
R01 CA137178 / CA / NCI NIH HHS / United States
K24 DK098311 / DK / NIDDK NIH HHS / United States
UM1 CA186107 / CA / NCI NIH HHS / United States
K07 CA190673 / NH / NIH HHS / United States
K07 CA190673 / CA / NCI NIH HHS / United States