Optimal Dynamic Treatment Regimes

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Abstract
Summary: A dynamic treatment regime is a list of decision rules, one per time interval, for how the level of treatment will be tailored through time to an individual’s changing status. The goal of this paper is to use experimental or observational data to estimate decision regimes that result in a maximal mean response. To explicate our objective and to state the assumptions, we use the potential outcomes model. The method proposed makes smooth parametric assumptions only on quantities that are directly relevant to the goal of estimating the optimal rules. We illustrate the methodology proposed via a small simulation.
Funding Information
  • National Institute for Drug Abuse (2P50 DA 10075)
  • National Institute for Drug Abuse career scientist (K02 DA 15674)
  • National Science Foundation (DMS 9802885)