Synthetic Control Methods for the Evaluation of Single-Unit Interventions in Epidemiology: A Tutorial.

ABSTRACT: Evaluating the impacts of population-level interventions (e.g., changes to state legislation) can be challenging as conducting randomized experiments is often impractical and inappropriate, especially in settings where the intervention is implemented in a single, aggregate unit (e.g., a country or state). A common nonrandomized alternative is to compare outcomes in the treated unit(s) with unexposed controls both before and after the intervention. However, the validity of these designs depends on the use of controls that closely resemble the treated unit on before-intervention characteristics and trends on the outcome, and suitable controls may be difficult to find because the number of potential control regions is typically limited. The synthetic control method provides a potential soluti

SUBMITTER: Bonander C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8634614 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature