A STATISTICAL-METHOD FOR ASSESSING A THRESHOLD IN EPIDEMIOLOGIC STUDIES

被引：138

作者：

ULM, K

机构：

[1] Institute for Medical Statistics and Epidemiology, Technical University Munich, Munich, 8000

来源：

STATISTICS IN MEDICINE | 1991年 / 10卷 / 03期

关键词：

D O I：

10.1002/sim.4780100306

中图分类号：

Q [生物科学];

学科分类号：

07 ; 0710 ; 09 ;

摘要：

I describe a method for estimating and testing a threshold value in epidemiological studies. A threshold effect indicates an association between a risk factor and a defined outcome above the threshold value but none below it. An important field of application is occupational medicine where, for a lot of chemical compounds and other agents which are non-carcinogenic health hazards, so-called threshold limit values of TLVs are specified. The method is presented within the framework of the logistic regression model, which is widely used in the analysis of the relationship between some explanatory variables and a dependent dichotomous outcome. In most available programs for this and also for other models the concept of a threshold is disregarded. The method for assessing a threshold consists of an estimation procedure using the maximum-likelihood technique and a test procedure based on the likelihood-ratio statistic R, following under the null hypothesis (no threshold) a quasi one-sided chi-2 distribution with one degree of freedom. This use of this distribution is supported by a simulation study. The method is applied to data from an epidemiological study of the relationship between occupational dust exposure and chronic bronchitic reactions. The results are confirmed by bootstrap resampling.

引用

页码：341 / 349

页数：9

共 22 条

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