A STOCHASTIC-MODEL FOR THE DISTRIBUTION OF HIV LATENCY TIME BASED ON T4 COUNTS
成果类型：
Article
署名作者：
BERMAN, SM
刊物名称：
BIOMETRIKA
ISSN/ISSBN：
0006-3444
DOI：
10.2307/2337096
发表日期：
1990
页码：
733741
关键词：
摘要：
A mathematical model is proposed for the description of the T4 level, as a function of the time since initial infection, in the blood of an HIV-infected individual. Two random variables are defined for each infected individual, the time T from the moment of infection to the moment when the infection is first discovered, and the level R of T4 cells in the blood at the time of the discovery. Here T is the length of the latency period, and is not typically observable. On the basis of a stochastic model employing a stationary Gaussian process, the joint density of these two random variables is derived, and hence the conditional distribution of T, given R. It is shown that if T has a exponential marginal distribution, then the conditional distribution of T is a censored normal distribution. The theory is applied to data collected from intravenous drug users in New York City.