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Updated: Jun 12, 2026

Inverse Probability of Treatment Weighting (Propensity Score) using the Military Health System Data Repository and National Death Index
Published on: January 8, 2020
Using Non-experimental Data to Estimate Treatment Effects
Elizabeth A Stuart1, Sue M Marcus, Marcela V Horvitz-Lennon
1Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore.
Abstract:
While much psychiatric research is based on randomized controlled trials (RCTs), where patients are randomly assigned to treatments, sometimes RCTs are not feasible. This paper describes propensity score approaches, which are increasingly used for estimating treatment effects in non-experimental settings. The primary goal of propensity score methods is to create sets of treated and comparison subjects who look as similar as possible, in essence replicating a randomized experiment, at least with respect to observed patient characteristics. A study to estimate the metabolic effects of antipsychotic medication in a sample of Florida Medicaid beneficiaries with schizophrenia illustrates methods.
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