Most survival analysis models for time-to-event data, like Cox regression, assume independence. The survival time for one individual cannot influence the survival time for another.
This assumption doesn’t hold in many study designs. You may have animals clustered into litters, matched pairs, or patients in a multi-center trial with correlated survival times within a center.
One of the hardest steps in any project is learning to ask the right research question!
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Interactions in statistical models are never especially easy to interpret. Throw in non-normal outcome variables and non-linear prediction functions and they become even more difficult to understand. (more…)
Many data sets are challenging and time consuming to work with because the data are seldom in an optimal format.