Improve Sensitivity Analysis Synthesizing Randomized Clinical Trials With Limited Overlap

To estimate the average treatment effect in real-world populations, observational studies are typically designed around real-world cohorts. However, even when study samples from these designs represent the population, unmeasured confounders can introduce bias. Sensitivity analysis is often used to estimate bounds for the average treatment effect without relying on the strict mathematical assumptions of other existing methods. This article introduces a new approach that improves sensitivity analysis in observational studies by incorporating randomized clinical trial data, even with limited overlap due to inclusion/exclusion criteria. Theoretical proof and simulations show that this method provides a tighter bound width than existing approaches. We also apply this method to both a trial dataset and a real-world drug effectiveness comparison dataset for practical analysis.