This vignette describes two functions for estimating optimal sample size and sample composition in growth reference centile studies, based on the paper by Cole (2020).
There are two criteria that determine the optimal sample size
N
and sample composition λ in centile studies:
z
SEz
Take for example the Cuban Growth Study (Healy 1974, Jordan 1975),
which was designed to estimate the 3rd height centile for boys aged 8
with a standard error (SE
) of 0.3 cm.
The 3rd centile corresponds to z
= -1.88, and the
required SE
in z-score units is obtained by dividing the
SE
by the height SD
at age 8 of 5.75 cm. This
gives the precision in z-score units as SEz
= 0.3/5.75 =
0.053.
Cole (2020) pointed out that when calculating sample size it is
essential to think also about sample composition, i.e. the age
distribution of the measurements. All centile studies need to collect
extra data in infancy compared to later in childhood, because babies
grow faster than children. But just how much more depends on
which centile is the focus. The median requires heavy infant
oversampling, whereas the 0.4th centile where z
= -2.67
needs very little.
The degree of oversampling is defined by the quantity λ, see Cole (2020), where λ = 1 means uniform sampling, while for example λ = 0.4 indicates heavy infant oversampling.
To run the examples, first load the tidyverse
and
sitar
libraries.
The optimal_design
function takes as arguments
z
, lambda
, N
, SEz
and age
. It then calculates the optimal sample composition,
based either on z
or lambda
, and the optimal
sample size based either on N
or SEz
. If both
N
and SEz
are given, N
takes
precedence. If both z
and lambda
are given,
SEz
also depends on age
.
The return value is p
, the centile corresponding to
z
, with its 95% confidence interval.
The following code estimates optimal lambda
and
SEz
for nine centiles spaced two-thirds of a z-score apart,
based on a sample of 10,000 children.
z | lambda | N | SEz | age | p | plo | phi |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
-2.67 | 0.90 | 10000 | 0.065 | 10 | 0.4th | 0.26 | 0.56 |
-2.00 | 0.76 | 10000 | 0.054 | 10 | 2nd | 1.75 | 2.93 |
-1.33 | 0.60 | 10000 | 0.044 | 10 | 9th | 7.75 | 10.66 |
-0.67 | 0.45 | 10000 | 0.037 | 10 | 25th | 22.97 | 27.64 |
0.00 | 0.38 | 10000 | 0.033 | 10 | 50th | 47.34 | 52.66 |
0.67 | 0.45 | 10000 | 0.037 | 10 | 75th | 72.36 | 77.03 |
1.33 | 0.60 | 10000 | 0.044 | 10 | 91st | 89.34 | 92.25 |
2.00 | 0.76 | 10000 | 0.054 | 10 | 98th | 97.07 | 98.25 |
2.67 | 0.90 | 10000 | 0.065 | 10 | 99.6th | 99.44 | 99.74 |
What the table shows is unsurprising, that a sample of 10,000
children estimates the median (p
= 50th centile) much more
precisely than the 0.4th centile (and by symmetry the 99.6th centile),
with SEz
0.033 compared to 0.065. The 95% confidence
interval for the 50th centile is (47.3, 52.7) and that for the 0.4th
centile is (0.26, 0.56).
In addition lambda
increases from 0.38 on the median to
0.90 on the 0.4th and 99.6th centiles, indicating a large shift in
sample composition. Let’s see what the corresponding age distributions
look like.
minage <- 0
maxage <- 20
N <- 1e4
map_dfr(c(1, 0.9, 0.38), ~{
tibble(age = (runif(N, minage^.x, maxage^.x))^(1/.x),
p = .x)
}) %>%
mutate(lambda = fct_reorder(factor(p), -p)) %>%
ggplot(aes(age, group = lambda)) +
geom_histogram(fill = 'gray', binwidth = 1) +
facet_wrap(. ~ lambda, labeller = label_both) +
xlab('age (years)') + ylab('frequency')
The figure shows the impact of lambda
on the age
distribution. When lambda
= 1 sampling is uniform across
the age range – the histogram shows one-year age groups with about 500
per group. In practice this design is rarely appropriate for growth
studies.
With lambda
= 0.9, suitable for the 0.4th and 99.6th
centiles, the sampling is close to uniform.
However with lambda
= 0.38, which is appropriate for
estimating the median, there is dramatic oversampling in early infancy.
This is needed to accurately estimate the shape of the median curve soon
after birth when it is at its steepest.
The function n_agegp
extends optimal_design
by giving the numbers of measurements to collect per age group.
It takes as arguments z
, lambda
,
N
and SEz
, similar to
optimal_design
. In addition its arguments
minage
, maxage
and n_groups
define the age range and number of groups. The groups are of equal
width, defaulting to 20 groups from 0 to 20 years, i.e. each one year
width.
It returns n_varying
the numbers per age group, and
age
the mean ages for the groups.
In addition it returns results for cohort studies where the number
per age group is fixed at n
= N
/
n_groups
, and the target ages of measurement are given by
age_varying
.
The following code calculates the age group sizes optimised for centiles from the 0.4th to the 99.6th, with a sample of 10,000 children from 0 to 20 years in one-year groups.
n_table <- map_dfc(-4:4*2/3, ~{
n_agegp(z = .x, N = 10000) %>%
select(!!z2cent(.x) := n_varying)
}) %>%
bind_cols(tibble(age = paste(0:19, 1:20, sep = '-')), .)
knitr::kable(n_table)
age | 0.4th | 2nd | 9th | 25th | 50th | 75th | 91st | 98th | 99.6th |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
0-1 | 679 | 1039 | 1662 | 2587 | 3172 | 2587 | 1662 | 1039 | 679 |
1-2 | 586 | 715 | 855 | 950 | 965 | 950 | 855 | 715 | 586 |
2-3 | 556 | 629 | 692 | 710 | 696 | 710 | 692 | 629 | 556 |
3-4 | 537 | 579 | 604 | 589 | 563 | 589 | 604 | 579 | 537 |
4-5 | 523 | 544 | 545 | 512 | 482 | 512 | 545 | 544 | 523 |
5-6 | 512 | 518 | 503 | 459 | 425 | 459 | 503 | 518 | 512 |
6-7 | 504 | 497 | 470 | 418 | 384 | 418 | 470 | 497 | 504 |
7-8 | 496 | 480 | 444 | 387 | 351 | 387 | 444 | 480 | 496 |
8-9 | 490 | 466 | 422 | 361 | 325 | 361 | 422 | 466 | 490 |
9-10 | 484 | 453 | 404 | 340 | 303 | 340 | 404 | 453 | 484 |
10-11 | 479 | 442 | 388 | 322 | 285 | 322 | 388 | 442 | 479 |
11-12 | 475 | 433 | 374 | 306 | 270 | 306 | 374 | 433 | 475 |
12-13 | 471 | 424 | 362 | 292 | 256 | 292 | 362 | 424 | 471 |
13-14 | 467 | 416 | 351 | 280 | 244 | 280 | 351 | 416 | 467 |
14-15 | 464 | 409 | 341 | 269 | 234 | 269 | 341 | 409 | 464 |
15-16 | 461 | 402 | 332 | 260 | 224 | 260 | 332 | 402 | 461 |
16-17 | 458 | 396 | 324 | 251 | 216 | 251 | 324 | 396 | 458 |
17-18 | 455 | 391 | 316 | 243 | 208 | 243 | 316 | 391 | 455 |
18-19 | 452 | 385 | 309 | 236 | 201 | 236 | 309 | 385 | 452 |
19-20 | 450 | 380 | 303 | 229 | 195 | 229 | 303 | 380 | 450 |
The table shows how the sample composition varies depending on which centile is optimised. Comparing the 50th and 0.4th centiles, the optimal number for the 50th centile is more than four times the size in the first year but less than half the size at age 19-20. This matches the histogram above.
n_agegp
can also be used to design studies over a
narrower age range, e.g. 0-5 years. For example there are 3506 children
in this age range in the table optimised for the 2nd centile, and the
following code returns the same group sizes (bar rounding):
knitr::kable(n_agegp(z = 2, N = 3506, minage = 0, maxage = 5, n_groups = 5) %>%
select(age, n_varying))
age | n_varying |
---|---|
0.5 | 1038 |
1.5 | 715 |
2.5 | 629 |
3.5 | 579 |
4.5 | 544 |
This shows that the sample composition optimised for age 0-20 is also optimal for subsets of the age range.
A third example contrasts the Cuban Growth Study design, as mentioned
earlier, with the optimal design based on the specified precision of
SEz
= 0.053 on the 3rd centile, which Healy (1974) showed
required 1000 boys aged 8.
For an optimal design the required precision should apply across the age range. The code shows the age distribution for 0-20 years that was used in the Study, including a 10% uplift in numbers to give 1100 at age 8, and the corresponding design had it been optimised.
# define CGS age distribution
tibble(age = c(1/6, 1/2, 5/6, 5/4, 7/4, 19/8, 25/8, 4:10,
c(22:29/2 - 1/4), 15:18, 77/4),
n = c(rep(12, 3), rep(10, 4), 13, rep(11, 6), rep(6, 3),
rep(11, 5), 15, rep(8, 3), 13) * 100,
span = c(rep(1/3, 3), rep(1/2, 2), rep(3/4, 2), rep(1, 7),
rep(1/2, 8), rep(1, 4), 3/2)) %>%
ggplot(aes(x = age, y = n/span, width = span-0.02)) +
xlab('age (years)') + ylab('frequency') +
geom_bar(fill = 'gray', stat = 'identity') +
geom_bar(aes(y = n_varying, width = NULL),
data = n_agegp(z = qnorm(0.03), SEz = 0.3 / 5.75) %>%
mutate(n_varying = n_varying * 1.1),
width = 0.98, fill = 'gray50', stat = 'identity')
The pale gray histogram shows the complex sample composition used in the Cuban Growth Study, with oversampling in infancy and puberty reflecting the higher growth velocity at those ages.
However the pubertal oversampling is unnecessary, and the design ignores the saving in numbers that is achieved by smoothing the centile curves.
The darker histogram shows the optimal design. Overall the sample size could have been reduced from 28,000 to around 11,000. This highlights the saving in resources that optimisation can achieve.
Cole TJ. 2020. Sample size and sample composition for constructing growth reference centiles. Stat Methods Med Res (in press).
Healy MJR. 1974. Notes on the statistics of growth standards. Ann Hum Biol 1:41-46.
Jordan J, Ruben M, Jernandez J, Bebelagua A, Tanner JM, Goldstein H. 1975. The 1972 Cuban national child growth study as an example of population health monitoring: design and methods. Ann Hum Biol 2:153-171.