ArticleEmerging themes in epidemiology2018
An introduction to instrumental variable assumptions, validation and estimation.
Article in Emerging themes in epidemiology, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 73 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
73 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Individual and organizational interventions to reduce burnout in resident physicians: a systematic review and meta-analysis.BMC medical education · 2024Pooled it
- Application of causal inference methods in individual-participant data meta-analyses in medicine: addressing data handling and reporting gaps with new proposed reporting guidelines.BMC medical research methodology · 2024Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Statistical methods for non-adherence in non-inferiority trials: useful and used? A systematic review.BMJ open · 2022Pooled it
- The role of the built environment, food prices and neighborhood poverty in fruit and vegetable consumption: An instrumental variable analysis of the moving to opportunity experiment.Health & place · 2021Trial
- Canon enables causal inference of downstream genes in single-cell CRISPR studies via instrumental variable analysis.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Causal relationships between insomnia and blood metabolome: a Mendelian randomization study with mouse experimental validation.Metabolomics : Official journal of the Metabolomic Society · 2026Article
- The effects of circulating proteins and metabolites on diabetic foot ulcer: A Mendelian randomization study and mediation analysis.Medicine · 2026Article
- Primary Care Involvement and Health Care Utilization Among Patients With End-Stage Kidney Disease.JAMA network open · 2026Article
- Causal Relationship Between Physical Activity and Body Weight: A Maximum Likelihood Treatment Effect Model Approach Using Australian Longitudinal Data.International journal of behavioral medicine · 2026Article
- A longitudinal study of the effects of risk perception and response efficacy on adaptation of elderly individuals and individuals with chronic health conditions to heat waves.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Clonal hematopoiesis of indeterminate potential as a risk factor for atrial fibrillation: Evidence of a causal relationship by Mendelian randomization study.Heart rhythm O2 · 2025Article
- Clinical implications of bone marrow adiposity identified by phenome-wide association and Mendelian randomization in the UK Biobank.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Transcriptome-wide root causal inference.PLoS computational biology · 2025Article
- Impact of Initial Cardiology Telemedicine Evaluation on Follow-Up Visits for Common Conditions: Quasi-Experimental Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Article
- Causal association between PMScientific reports · 2025Article
- Spatiotemporal effect of internet use on life expectancy: cross-country insight from a geographically and temporally weighted analysis.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Characteristics of non-drinking and drinking adults in Taiwan and their implications in alcohol epidemiological studies.PloS one · 2025Article
- Triangulating Instrumental Variable, confounder adjustment and difference-in-difference methods for comparative effectiveness research in observational data.Wellcome open research · 2025Article
- Art for health's sake or health for art's sake: Disentangling the bidirectional relationships between arts engagement and mental health.PNAS nexus · 2024Article
13 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
1 author.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The instrumental variable method has been employed within economics to infer causality in the presence of unmeasured confounding. Emphasising the parallels to randomisation may increase understanding of the underlying assumptions within epidemiology. An instrument is a variable that predicts exposure, but conditional on exposure shows no independent association with the outcome. The random assignment in trials is an example of what would be expected to be an ideal instrument, but instruments can also be found in observational settings with a naturally varying phenomenon e.g. geographical variation, physical distance to facility or physician's preference. The fourth identifying assumption has received less attention, but is essential for the generalisability of estimated effects. The instrument identifies the group of
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.