Cumulative incidence function estimation using population-based biobank data.

Abstract

Many countries have established population-based biobanks, which are being used increasingly in epidemiological and clinical research. These biobanks offer opportunities for large-scale studies addressing questions beyond the scope of traditional clinical trials or cohort studies. However, using biobank data poses new challenges. Typically, biobank data are collected from a study cohort recruited over a defined calendar period, with subjects entering the study at various ages falling between $c_L$ and $c_U$. This work focuses on biobank data with individuals reporting disease-onset age upon recruitment, termed prevalent data, along with individuals initially recruited as healthy, and their disease onset observed during the follow-up period. We propose a novel cumulative incidence function (CIF) estimator that efficiently incorporates prevalent cases, in contrast to existing methods, providing two advantages: (1) increased efficiency and (2) CIF estimation for ages before the lower limit, $c_L$.