SA Branch webinar: Instrumental variables: a review of the rationale for their use, assumptions and validation methods with application to estimating the impact of health spending on health outcomes

** RESCHEDULED **

Due to unforeseen circumstances, the Branch meeting originally scheduled for October 21st has been rescheduled for the 28th. We hope you can join us then.

Branch Meeting - Wednesday, 28th October 2020

The South Australian Branch of the Statistical Society would like to invite you to the October meeting of the 2020 program.

Virtual Venue via Zoom meeting:

https://adelaide.zoom.us/j/89481570353?pwd=MzBlbEk5S3JQam9senFCUXFVaU9YUT09

Password: 224012

or Join from dial-in phone line:

Dial: +61 8 7150 1149

Meeting ID: 894 8157 0353

Speaker: Dr Laura Edney, Flinders University

Topic: Instrumental variables: a review of the rationale for their use, assumptions and validation methods with application to estimating the impact of health spending on health outcomes

Abstract

Instrumental variables (IVs) have been used to make causal conclusions from observational data when randomized controlled trials are not feasible. IV methods have been widely used to estimate the impact that spending on health has on health outcomes due, in part, to historic health outcomes representing an important unmeasured confounder that, if uncontrolled for, will result in biased coefficients on spending in standard regression models.

This presentation will describe the motivation for the use of IVs, the assumptions they make and how these can be appropriately tested either directly or through sensitivity analyses by examining the impact of assumption violation. To illustrate these key concepts, we will review the application of IVs to estimating the impact of health spending on health outcomes focusing on eight publications that have estimated this relationship nationally.