Retrospectively Sampled Time-to-Pregnancy Data May Make Age-Decreasing Fecundity Look Increasing
- 1 November 2000
- journal article
- other
- Published by Wolters Kluwer Health in Epidemiology
- Vol. 11 (6) , 717-719
- https://doi.org/10.1097/00001648-200011000-00019
Abstract
The retrospective study based on pregnancy samples is the most commonly used method for studying time to pregnancy. Using a simple Monte Carlo simulation, this note focuses on a particular selection bias problem associated with this design: even if each woman’s fecundity decreases with age, estimation of the effect of age may show the opposite trend. We recommend exercising increased caution in interpreting findings from pregnancy-based time-to-pregnancy studies.Keywords
This publication has 6 references indexed in Scilit:
- Some Issues in Assessing Human FertilityJournal of the American Statistical Association, 2000
- Infertility and subfecundity in population-based samples from Denmark, Germany, Italy, Poland and SpainEuropean Journal of Public Health, 1999
- Measuring time to pregnancy. Methodological issues to considerHuman Reproduction, 1998
- A Discrete Survival Model with Random Effects: An Application to Time to PregnancyPublished by JSTOR ,1997
- USE OF TIME TO PREGNANCY TO STUDY ENVIRONMENTAL EXPOSURESAmerican Journal of Epidemiology, 1986