Analyze Cervical Cancer Relapse Using Cox Proportional Hazards Model

Relapse and factors that affect relapse were analyzed using data on 905 cervical cancer patients by making use of Cox proportional hazards model. The period of this cervical cancer study was conducted from May 1984 to August 2001. Seven categorical and three continuous design variables were measured for each patient. For preliminary statistical analysis, seven design variables were found to be significant at 5% significance level. We reduced the number of variables via backward elimination method to find a survival model to best explain the cervix cancer relapse. The final survival model could be inferred that three factors, disease and depth and size of tumor, among ten design variables had most significant effects on cervix cancer relapse. Relapse rate functions of patients with large tumor were also smoothed.