title: Multiple imputation of missing covariates for the Cox proportional hazards cure model.
abstract: We explore several approaches for imputing partially observed covariates when the outcome of interest is a censored event time and when there is an underlying subset of the population that will never experience the event of interest. We call these subjects 'cured', and we consider the case where the data are modeled using a Cox proportional hazards (CPH) mixture cure model. We study covariate imputation approaches using fully conditional specification. We derive the exact conditional distribution and suggest a sampling scheme for imputing partially observed covariates in the CPH cure model setting. We also propose several approximations to the exact distribution that are simpler and more convenient to use for imputation. A simulation study demonstrates that the proposed imputation approaches outperform existing imputation approaches for survival data without a cure fraction in terms of bias in estimating CPH cure model parameters. We apply our multiple imputation techniques to a study of patients with head and neck cancer. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, U.S.A.. lbeesley@umich.edu.
authors.forename: Lauren J
authors.initials: LJ
authors.lastname: Beesley
authors.affiliation: Statistical Innovation Group, AstraZeneca, Cambridge, U.K.
authors.forename: Jonathan W
authors.identifier: 0000-0001-7117-0195
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Bartlett
authors.affiliation: Department of Otolaryngology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, U.S.A.
authors.forename: Gregory T
authors.initials: GT
authors.lastname: Wolf
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, U.S.A.
authors.forename: Jeremy M G
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Taylor
mesh_terms: D015982:Bias; D003627:Data Interpretation, Statistical; D006258:Head and Neck Neoplasms / Q000628:therapy; D006801:Humans; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models
keywords: cure models; fully conditional specification; multiple imputation