Evidence map›Paper›PMID 41844366›Full record

ArticleStatistics in medicine2026

Comparison of Methods for Sensitivity Analysis of Heterogeneous Treatment Effects in Observational Studies and Application to Alzheimer's Disease and Cognitive Decline.

Jingqi Duan, Corinne D Engelman, Qiongshi Lu, Hyunseung Kang

Abstract readComparative Study
In one paragraph

Article in Statistics in medicine, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
0citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

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.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

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.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

0 citing papers in PubMed.

No citing paper in PubMed yet.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

4 authors.

Jingqi DuanDepartment of Statistics, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin, USA.ORCID https://orcid.org/0009-0007-0511-4655
Corinne D EngelmanDepartment of Population Health Sciences, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin, USA.
Qiongshi LuDepartment of Biostatistics and Medical Informatics, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin, USA.
Hyunseung KangDepartment of Statistics, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin, USA.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

In Alzheimer's disease (AD) research, many observational studies have shown that the effect of sleeping quality, a modifiable risk factor, on cognitive decline is heterogeneous, where some adults experience faster rates of cognitive decline compared to others. However, these effects are likely confounded by unmeasured confounders, and the sensitivity of these effects to unmeasured confounders may be heterogeneous, where one subgroup's treatment effect is more sensitive than that of another subgroup. Unfortunately, compared to the overall treatment effect, there are limited investigations about the sensitivity of heterogeneous treatment effects to unmeasured confounding. The paper presents and compares methods for sensitivity analysis of heterogeneous effects in observational studies based on Rosenbaum's model for sensitivity analysis. We show that, unlike the sensitivity analysis of the overall treatment effect, the sensitivity of heterogeneous treatment effects depends on the variation in the effect sizes across subgroups and the correction for multiple testing. The data analysis further supports our findings where the overall effect of sleep disturbances on cognitive decline is significant (

Indexed as

Alzheimer DiseaseCognitive DysfunctionObservational Studies as TopicHumansMaleModels, StatisticalSensitivity and SpecificitySleep QualitySleep Wake DisordersTreatment Effect Heterogeneitycognitive declineheterogeneous treatment effectsoptimal matchingsensitivity analysissleep

Identifiers

PMID41844366
PMCPMC12995544

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Registered trials

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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.