The LIFETEST Procedure

The following statements are available in the LIFETEST procedure:

The simplest use of PROC LIFETEST is to request the nonparametric estimates of the survivor function for a sample of survival times. In such a case, only the PROC LIFETEST statement and the TIME statement are required. You can use the STRATA statement to divide the data into various strata. A separate survivor function is then estimated for each stratum, and tests of the homogeneity of strata are performed. However, if the GROUP= option is also specified in the STRATA statement, stratified tests are carried out to test the k samples that are defined by the GROUP= variable while controlling for the effect of the STRATA variables. You can specify covariates in the TEST statement. PROC LIFETEST computes linear rank statistics to test the effects of these covariates on survival.

The PROC LIFETEST statement invokes the procedure. All statements except the TIME statement are optional, and there is no required order for the statements that follow the PROC LIFETEST statement. The TIME statement specifies the variables that define the survival time and censoring indicator. The STRATA statement specifies a variable or set of variables that define the strata for the analysis. The TEST statement specifies a list of numeric covariates to be tested for their association with the response survival time. Each variable is tested individually, and a joint test statistic is also computed. The ID statement provides a list of variables whose values identify observations in the product-limit, Breslow, or Fleming-Harrington estimates. When only the TIME statement appears, no strata are defined and no tests of homogeneity are performed.