Further Results on Piecewise Constant Hazard Functions in Aalen's Additive Risk Model

Abstract

The modifications suggested in Uhm et al. (2011) are studied using a partly parametric version of Aalen's additive risk model. A follow-up time period is partitioned into intervals, and hazard functions are estimated as a piecewise constant in each interval. A maximum likelihood estimator by iteratively reweighted least squares and variance estimates are suggested based on the model as well as evaluated by simulations using mean square error and a coverage probability, respectively. In conclusion the modifications are needed when there are a small number of uncensored deaths in an interval to estimate the piecewise constant hazard function.