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Zero-cell corrections in random-effects meta-analyses

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  • Weber, Frank
  • Knapp, Guido
  • Ickstadt, Katja
  • Kundt, Günther
  • Glass, Anne

Abstract

The standard estimator for the log odds ratio (the unconditional maximum likelihood estimator) and the delta-method estimator for its standard error are not defined if the corresponding 2x2 table contains at least one "zero cell". This is also an issue when estimating the overall log odds ratio in a meta-analysis. It is well known that correcting for zero cells by adding a small increment should be avoided. Nevertheless, these zero-cell corrections continue to be used. With this article, we want to warn of a particularly bad zero-cell correction. For this, we conduct a simulation study comparing the following two zero-cell corrections under the ordinary random-effects model: (i) adding 1/2 to all cells of all the individual studies' 2x2 tables independently of any zero-cell occurrences and (ii) adding 1/2 to all cells of only those 2x2 tables containing at least one zero cell. The main finding is that correction (i) performs worse than correction (ii). Thus, we strongly discourage the use of correction (i).

Suggested Citation

  • Weber, Frank & Knapp, Guido & Ickstadt, Katja & Kundt, Günther & Glass, Anne, 2020. "Zero-cell corrections in random-effects meta-analyses," OSF Preprints qjh5f, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:osfxxx:qjh5f
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/qjh5f
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Alan Agresti, 1999. "On Logit Confidence Intervals for the Odds Ratio with Small Samples," Biometrics, The International Biometric Society, vol. 55(2), pages 597-602, June.
    2. Kurex Sidik & Jeffrey N. Jonkman, 2005. "Simple heterogeneity variance estimation for meta‐analysis," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series C, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 54(2), pages 367-384, April.
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    Cited by:

    1. Francisco-José Vázquez-Polo & Miguel-Ángel Negrín-Hernández & María Martel-Escobar, 2020. "Meta-Analysis with Few Studies and Binary Data: A Bayesian Model Averaging Approach," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 8(12), pages 1-13, December.
    2. Weber, Frank & Knapp, Guido & Glass, Anne & Kundt, Günther & Ickstadt, Katja, 2020. "Interval estimation of the overall treatment effect in random-effects meta-analyses: Recommendations from a simulation study comparing frequentist, Bayesian, and bootstrap methods," OSF Preprints 5zbh6, Center for Open Science.

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