Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge / 2015 / iii / Paper 35 / 6

The history ${\mathcal{H}}_{t-}$ contains the information observed strictly before $t$: baseline characteristics, previous events and censoring, and therefore which individuals are currently eligible and under observation. Formally it is the pre-$t$ information in the relevant filtration. The at-risk process $Y_i(t)$ is 1 if individual $i$ is observed and event-free immediately before $t$, and 0 otherwise. Let $Y_{+}(t)={\sum }_i{Y}_i(t)$ and write $dH(t)=h(t)dt$ for the cumulative hazard increment.

The counting-process intensity in survival analysis givesThe common conditional hazard function is assumed to remain applicable after conditioning on the observed history, as under suitable independent censoring. Summing gives the conditional mean of the total event increment:On times with $Y_{+}(t)>0$, invert this relation to estimate the hazard increment:The last sum is for untied events. This is the Nelson–Aalen estimator; for ties replace 1 by the number of events at that time. No increment can be estimated once the risk set is empty.

In the no-simultaneous-event infinitesimal representation, the event increment is binary, so $d{N}_{+}(t{)}^2=d{N}_{+}(t)$. Its second moment equals its first moment:This uses the assumed binary increment. In an ordinary finite interval more than one event is possible, and the equality would not hold exactly; the no-ties counting-process calculation concerns the first-order infinitesimal terms.

Put $q_t=\mathrm{Pr}(d{N}_{+}(t)=1\mid {\mathcal{H}}_{t-})$. A binary event increment has conditional variance $q_t(1-q_t)$. Since $q_t=Y_{+}(t)h(t)dt+o(dt)$, its squared mean is of second order, givingTreating the predictable risk set size as known given the history, the Nelson–Aalen estimator increment therefore has first-order varianceSubstitute $d\hat{H}=d{N}_{+}/Y_{+}$ for $dH$ to obtain the estimated increment variance $d{N}_{+}/Y_{+}^2$. Summing these estimated predictable variances gives the usual Nelson–Aalen variance estimator:The martingale $d{N}_{+}-Y_{+}dH$ has orthogonal increments, which justifies accumulating the predictable variances of the estimation error. This is an estimated sampling variance on the observed at-risk range, not a claim of exact finite-sample unbiasedness after the risk set becomes empty. For multiple events at an event time the usual extension replaces the numerator 1 by the event count.