Mediation models are a set of statistical techniques that investigates the mechanisms that produce an observed relationship between an exposure variable and an outcome variable in order to deduce the extent to which the relationship is influenced by intermediate mediator variables. For a case-control study, the most common mediation analysis strategy employs a counterfactual framework that permits estimation of indirect and direct effects on the odds ratio scale for dichotomous outcomes, assuming either binary or continuous mediators. We embed this framework in a unified likelihood approach, which allows natural incorporation of cases within the exposure-mediator model to improve efficiency. Our approach does not require knowledge of disease prevalence and can model confounders and exposure-mediator interactions

Participants:

• Dr. Michael Epstein

Software:

• https://github.com/epstein-software/MediationCC