ple_train uses base-learners along with a meta-learner to obtain patient-level
estimates under different treatment exposures (see Kunzel et al). For family="gaussian"
or "binomial", output estimates of \(\mu(a,x)=E(Y|x,a)\) and treatment differences
(average treatment effect or risk difference). For survival, either logHR based estimates
or RMST based estimates can be obtained. Current base-learner ("ple") options include:
1. linear: Uses either linear regression (family="gaussian"),
logistic regression (family="binomial"), or cox regression (family="survival").
No hyper-parameters.
2. ranger: Uses random forest ("ranger" R package). The default hyper-parameters are:
hyper = list(mtry=NULL, min.node.pct=0.10)
where mtry is number of randomly selected variables (default=NULL; sqrt(dim(X)))
and min.node.pct is the minimum node size as a function of the total data size
(ex: min.node.pct=10% requires at least 10
3. glmnet: Uses elastic net ("glmnet" R package). The default hyper-parameters are:
hyper = list(lambda="lambda.min")
where lambda controls the penalty parameter for predictions. lambda="lambda.1se"
will likely result in a less complex model.
4. bart: Uses bayesian additive regression trees (Chipman et al 2010;
BART R package). Default hyper-parameters are:
hyper = list(sparse=FALSE)
where sparse controls whether to perform variable selection based on a sparse
Dirichlet prior rather than simply uniform.