Table 3 Descriptive summary of the characteristics of the included studies
From: A scoping review of studies using observational data to optimise dynamic treatment regimens
| Clinical focus | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Characteristic | No | Yes | Overall |
| Publications (n) | 45 | 18 | 63 |
| Year published (%) | |||
| 1995 to 1999 | 1 (2) | 0 (0) | 1 (2) |
| 2000 to 2004 | 2 (4) | 0 (0) | 2 (3) |
| 2005 to 2009 | 6 (13) | 3 (17) | 9 (14) |
| 2010 to 2014 | 12 (27) | 6 (33) | 18 (29) |
| 2015 to 2019 | 18 (40) | 7 (39) | 25 (40) |
| 2020 | 6 (13) | 2 (11) | 8 (13) |
| Clinical area (%) | |||
| Cancer | 7 (16) | 1 (6) | 8 (13) |
| Diabetes | 6 (13) | 0 (0) | 6 (10) |
| HIV/AIDS | 15 (33) | 12 (67) | 27 (43) |
| Other | 14 (31) | 5 (28) | 19 (30) |
| Thrombosis | 3 (7) | 0 (0) | 3 (5) |
| Outcome type (%) | |||
| Binary | 4 (9) | 3 (17) | 7 (11) |
| Categorical | 1 (2) | 0 (0) | 1 (2) |
| Continuous | 17 (38) | 2 (11) | 19 (30) |
| Time-to-event | 23 (51) | 13 (72) | 36 (57) |
| Participants (median [IQR]) | 2604 [710, 13,039] | 9793 [3084, 39,887] | 3882 [1420, 23,602] |
| Funding source/s (%) | |||
| Non-profit | 4 (9) | 2 (11) | 6 (10) |
| Not reported | 9 (20) | 1 (6) | 10 (16) |
| Public | 35 (78) | 16 (89) | 51 (81) |
| Statistical method/s (%) | |||
| G-estimation | 4 (9) | 0 (0) | 4 (6) |
| Inverse probability weighting | 17 (38) | 9 (50) | 26 (41) |
| Other | 9 (20) | 1 (6) | 10 (16) |
| Parametric G-formula | 8 (18) | 8 (44) | 16 (25) |
| Q-learning | 9 (20) | 1 (6) | 10 (16) |
| Regret regression | 3 (7) | 0 (0) | 3 (5) |
| TMLE | 4 (9) | 0 (0) | 4 (6) |
| Missing data addressed (%) | 24 (53) | 8 (44) | 32 (51) |
| Model evaluation included (%) | 22 (49) | 8 (44) | 30 (48) |
| Model selection included (%) | 19 (42) | 15 (83) | 34 (54) |
| Sensitivity analysis included (%) | 23 (51) | 15 (83) | 38 (60) |
| Software included (%) | |||
| No | 25 (56) | 17 (94) | 42 (67) |
| R | 18 (40) | 0 (0) | 18 (29) |
| SAS | 2 (4) | 1 (6) | 3 (5) |