STRATA Statement

The PHREG Procedure

STRATA Statement

STRATA variable < ( list ) > < ... variable < ( list ) >> < /option > ;

The proportional hazards assumption may not be realistic for all data. If so, it may still be reasonable to perform a stratified analysis. The STRATA statement names the variables that determine the stratification. Strata are formed according to the nonmissing values of the STRATA variables unless the MISSING option is specified. In the STRATA statement, variable is a variable with values that are used to determine the strata levels, and list is an optional list of values for a numeric variable. Multiple variables can appear in the STRATA statement.

The values for variable can be formatted or unformatted. If the variable is a character variable, or if the variable is numeric and no list appears, then the strata are defined by the unique values of the variable. If the variable is numeric and is followed by a list, then the levels for that variable correspond to the intervals defined by the list. The corresponding strata are formed by the combination of levels and unique values. The list can include numeric values separated by commas or blanks, value to value by value range specifications, or combinations of these. For example, the specification

   strata age (5, 10 to 40 by 10) sex ;

indicates that the levels for age are to be less than 5, 5 to 10, 10 to 20, 20 to 30, 30 to 40, and greater than 40. (Note that observations with exactly the cutpoint value fall into the interval above the cutpoint.) Thus, with the sex variable, this STRATA statement specifies 12 strata altogether.

The following option can be specified in the STRATA statement after a slash (/).

MISSING: allows missing values (`.' for numeric variables and blanks for character variables) as valid STRATA variable values. Otherwise, observations with missing STRATA variable values are deleted from the analysis.

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