SURVIVAL ANALYSIS OF CANCER PATIENTS USING PARAMETRIC AND NON-PARAMETRIC APPROACHES

Abstract

Exploring the health related quality of life is usually the focus of the survival studies. Using the health data of cancer registry in Multan, Pakistan, an investigation about the survival pattern of cancer patients was explored, using the non-parametric and parametric modeling strategies. The Kaplan-Meier method and Weibull model based on Anderson-Darling test were applied to the real life time data. Findings suggested different sex-superiority of survival pattern among different groups of cancer patients. Interestingly, Kaplan-Meier and Weibul model provided a very close estimate of the survival function and other characteristics of interest.

Keywords

• Anderson-Darling test
• cancer patients
• hazard function
• Kaplan-Meier estimate
• survival function