Comparing net survival estimators of cancer patients

The net survival of a patient diagnosed with a given disease is a quantity often interpreted as the hypothetical survival probability in the absence of causes of death other than the disease. In a relative survival framework, net survival summarises the excess mortality that patients experience compared with their relevant reference population. Based on follow-up data from the Finnish Cancer Registry, we derived simulation scenarios that describe survival of patients in eight cancer sites reflecting different excess mortality patterns in order to compare the performance of the classical Ederer II estimator and the new estimator proposed by Pohar Perme et al. At 5 years, the age-standardised Ederer II estimator performed equally well as the Pohar Perme estimator with the exception of melanoma in which the Pohar Perme estimator had a smaller mean squared error (MSE). At 10 and 15 years, the age-standardised Ederer II performed most often better than the Pohar Perme estimator. The unstandardised Ederer II estimator had the largest MSE at 5 years. However, its MSE was often superior to those of the other estimators at 10 and 15 years, especially in sparse data. Both the Pohar Perme and the age-standardised Ederer II estimator are valid for 5-year net survival of cancer patients. For longer-term net survival, our simulation results support the use of the age-standardised Ederer II estimator.