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These functions determine which items in a vector can be considered (the start of) a new episode, based on the argument episode_days. This can be used to determine clinical episodes for any epidemiological analysis. The get_episode() function returns the index number of the episode per group, while the is_new_episode() function returns values TRUE/FALSE to indicate whether an item in a vector is the start of a new episode.

Usage

get_episode(x, episode_days, ...)

is_new_episode(x, episode_days, ...)

Arguments

x

vector of dates (class Date or POSIXt), will be sorted internally to determine episodes

episode_days

required episode length in days, can also be less than a day or Inf, see Details

...

ignored, only in place to allow future extensions

Value

  • get_episode(): a double vector

  • is_new_episode(): a logical vector

Details

Dates are first sorted from old to new. The oldest date will mark the start of the first episode. After this date, the next date will be marked that is at least episode_days days later than the start of the first episode. From that second marked date on, the next date will be marked that is at least episode_days days later than the start of the second episode which will be the start of the third episode, and so on. Before the vector is being returned, the original order will be restored.

The first_isolate() function is a wrapper around the is_new_episode() function, but is more efficient for data sets containing microorganism codes or names and allows for different isolate selection methods.

The dplyr package is not required for these functions to work, but these functions do support variable grouping and work conveniently inside dplyr verbs such as filter(), mutate() and summarise().

See also

Examples

# `example_isolates` is a data set available in the AMR package.
# See ?example_isolates
df <- example_isolates[sample(seq_len(2000), size = 200), ]

get_episode(df$date, episode_days = 60) # indices
#>   [1] 60 32 64 53 16 36 44 56 18 28 21 26 16 25 28 61 21 23 43 13 34 13 43 44 47
#>  [26] 55 65 65 19 65  7 41 20 49 53 19 44 57 33 51  6 33 22 32 36 46 62 55 38 56
#>  [51] 59  7 25 63 36 29 10 13 31 27 28 54 11 25 31 17 59 48 23 30 54 36 27 63 24
#>  [76]  9 25 11 17 50 41 49 56 27 21 12 48 37 48  5 15 18 20 22 11 41 12 43 43 13
#> [101] 49 39 55 20 10 64 43 50 14 43 47 60 40 26 32  3 41 26 59 35 44 61 24 18 42
#> [126] 36 41 41 54  1  1 53  8 29 45  2 59 60 48 53 35 30 41 63 58 46 18 53 61  9
#> [151] 30 10 14  4  7 62 62 39 30 27 54 29 24 60 40 41 63  6 42 21 25 23 19 15 52
#> [176]  8 54 36 11 43 10 33 56 30  2 45 23  1 57 64 65 22 31 35 10 25 15  2 34 53
is_new_episode(df$date, episode_days = 60) # TRUE/FALSE
#>   [1] FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE
#>  [13]  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE
#>  [25] FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE
#>  [37]  TRUE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE
#>  [49]  TRUE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE
#>  [61]  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE
#>  [73] FALSE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE
#>  [85] FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE  TRUE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE  TRUE FALSE FALSE
#>  [97]  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE
#> [109]  TRUE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE
#> [121] FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE
#> [133] FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE
#> [145]  TRUE  TRUE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE  TRUE FALSE  TRUE
#> [157] FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE
#> [169] FALSE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE  TRUE  TRUE FALSE FALSE FALSE
#> [181] FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE  TRUE  TRUE FALSE
#> [193] FALSE FALSE FALSE  TRUE FALSE  TRUE  TRUE FALSE

# filter on results from the third 60-day episode only, using base R
df[which(get_episode(df$date, 60) == 3), ]
#> # A tibble: 1 × 46
#>   date       patient   age gender ward  mo           PEN   OXA   FLC   AMX  
#>   <date>     <chr>   <dbl> <chr>  <chr> <mo>         <rsi> <rsi> <rsi> <rsi>
#> 1 2002-08-14 785317     51 F      ICU   B_ESCHR_COLI R     NA    NA    NA   
#> # … with 36 more variables: AMC <rsi>, AMP <rsi>, TZP <rsi>, CZO <rsi>,
#> #   FEP <rsi>, CXM <rsi>, FOX <rsi>, CTX <rsi>, CAZ <rsi>, CRO <rsi>,
#> #   GEN <rsi>, TOB <rsi>, AMK <rsi>, KAN <rsi>, TMP <rsi>, SXT <rsi>,
#> #   NIT <rsi>, FOS <rsi>, LNZ <rsi>, CIP <rsi>, MFX <rsi>, VAN <rsi>,
#> #   TEC <rsi>, TCY <rsi>, TGC <rsi>, DOX <rsi>, ERY <rsi>, CLI <rsi>,
#> #   AZM <rsi>, IPM <rsi>, MEM <rsi>, MTR <rsi>, CHL <rsi>, COL <rsi>,
#> #   MUP <rsi>, RIF <rsi>

# the functions also work for less than a day, e.g. to include one per hour:
get_episode(c(
  Sys.time(),
  Sys.time() + 60 * 60
),
episode_days = 1 / 24
)
#> [1] 1 2

# \donttest{
if (require("dplyr")) {
  # is_new_episode() can also be used in dplyr verbs to determine patient
  # episodes based on any (combination of) grouping variables:
  df %>%
    mutate(condition = sample(
      x = c("A", "B", "C"),
      size = 200,
      replace = TRUE
    )) %>%
    group_by(condition) %>%
    mutate(new_episode = is_new_episode(date, 365)) %>%
    select(patient, date, condition, new_episode)
}
#> # A tibble: 200 × 4
#> # Groups:   condition [3]
#>    patient date       condition new_episode
#>    <chr>   <date>     <chr>     <lgl>      
#>  1 305134  2016-10-28 A         TRUE       
#>  2 0DBB93  2009-05-08 C         FALSE      
#>  3 F50400  2017-09-08 A         FALSE      
#>  4 AC8303  2014-10-20 B         FALSE      
#>  5 425433  2005-07-11 C         FALSE      
#>  6 AB0003  2010-04-08 B         FALSE      
#>  7 452218  2012-05-04 A         FALSE      
#>  8 904640  2015-11-03 A         FALSE      
#>  9 968584  2006-01-11 B         TRUE       
#> 10 773560  2008-05-08 C         FALSE      
#> # … with 190 more rows
if (require("dplyr")) {
  df %>%
    group_by(ward, patient) %>%
    transmute(date,
      patient,
      new_index = get_episode(date, 60),
      new_logical = is_new_episode(date, 60)
    )
}
#> # A tibble: 200 × 5
#> # Groups:   ward, patient [186]
#>    ward     date       patient new_index new_logical
#>    <chr>    <date>     <chr>       <dbl> <lgl>      
#>  1 ICU      2016-10-28 305134          1 TRUE       
#>  2 ICU      2009-05-08 0DBB93          1 TRUE       
#>  3 Clinical 2017-09-08 F50400          1 TRUE       
#>  4 Clinical 2014-10-20 AC8303          1 TRUE       
#>  5 Clinical 2005-07-11 425433          1 TRUE       
#>  6 Clinical 2010-04-08 AB0003          1 TRUE       
#>  7 Clinical 2012-05-04 452218          1 TRUE       
#>  8 Clinical 2015-11-03 904640          1 TRUE       
#>  9 ICU      2006-01-11 968584          1 TRUE       
#> 10 Clinical 2008-05-08 773560          1 TRUE       
#> # … with 190 more rows
if (require("dplyr")) {
  df %>%
    group_by(ward) %>%
    summarise(
      n_patients = n_distinct(patient),
      n_episodes_365 = sum(is_new_episode(date, episode_days = 365)),
      n_episodes_60 = sum(is_new_episode(date, episode_days = 60)),
      n_episodes_30 = sum(is_new_episode(date, episode_days = 30))
    )
}
#> # A tibble: 3 × 5
#>   ward       n_patients n_episodes_365 n_episodes_60 n_episodes_30
#>   <chr>           <int>          <int>         <int>         <int>
#> 1 Clinical          110             14            53            71
#> 2 ICU                62             12            38            50
#> 3 Outpatient         14              9            12            13
if (require("dplyr")) {

  # grouping on patients and microorganisms leads to the same
  # results as first_isolate() when using 'episode-based':
  x <- df %>%
    filter_first_isolate(
      include_unknown = TRUE,
      method = "episode-based"
    )

  y <- df %>%
    group_by(patient, mo) %>%
    filter(is_new_episode(date, 365)) %>%
    ungroup()

  identical(x, y)
}
#> Including isolates from ICU.
#> [1] FALSE
if (require("dplyr")) {

  # but is_new_episode() has a lot more flexibility than first_isolate(),
  # since you can now group on anything that seems relevant:
  df %>%
    group_by(patient, mo, ward) %>%
    mutate(flag_episode = is_new_episode(date, 365)) %>%
    select(group_vars(.), flag_episode)
}
#> # A tibble: 200 × 4
#> # Groups:   patient, mo, ward [195]
#>    patient mo           ward     flag_episode
#>    <chr>   <mo>         <chr>    <lgl>       
#>  1 305134  B_PROTS_VLGR ICU      TRUE        
#>  2 0DBB93  B_ESCHR_COLI ICU      TRUE        
#>  3 F50400  B_STPHY_EPDR Clinical TRUE        
#>  4 AC8303  B_STPHY_HMLY Clinical TRUE        
#>  5 425433  B_ESCHR_COLI Clinical TRUE        
#>  6 AB0003  B_STRPT_ANGN Clinical TRUE        
#>  7 452218  B_STPHY_CONS Clinical TRUE        
#>  8 904640  B_PROTS_MRBL Clinical TRUE        
#>  9 968584  F_CANDD_ALBC ICU      TRUE        
#> 10 773560  B_STPHY_EPDR Clinical TRUE        
#> # … with 190 more rows
# }