Mesothelioma is a rare cancer caused by exposure to asbestos. Belgium has a known long history of asbestos production, resulting in one of the highest mesothelioma mortality rates worldwide. While the production of asbestos has stopped completely, the long latency period of mesothelioma, which can fluctuate between 20 and 40 years after exposure, causes incidences still to be frequent. Mesothelioma's long incubation time affects our assessment of its geographical distribution as well. Since patients' residential locations are likely to change a number of times throughout their lives, the location where the patients develop the disease is often far from the location where they were exposed to asbestos. Using the residential history of patients, we propose the use of a convolution multiple membership model (MMM), which includes both a spatial conditional autoregressive and an unstructured random effect. Pancreatic cancer patients are used as a control population, reflecting the population at risk for mesothelioma. Results show the impact of the residential mobility on the geographical risk estimation, as well as the importance of acknowledging the latency period of a disease. A simulation study was conducted to investigate the properties of the convolution MMM. The robustness of the results for the convolution MMM is assessed via a sensitivity analysis.

中文翻译：

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居住历史对长潜伏期疾病空间分析的影响：比利时间皮瘤研究。

间皮瘤是由接触石棉引起的罕见癌症。比利时拥有悠久的石棉生产历史，是世界上间皮瘤死亡率最高的国家之一。尽管石棉的生产已完全停止，但间皮瘤的长时间潜伏期（可能在接触后的20至40年之间波动）使发病率仍然很频繁。间皮瘤的潜伏期长，也影响我们对其地理分布的评估。由于患者的居住位置在整个生命中可能会发生多次变化，因此患者患病的位置通常远离他们接触石棉的位置。根据患者的居住史，我们建议使用卷积多成员模型（MMM），其中包括空间条件自回归和非结构化随机效应。胰腺癌患者被用作对照人群，反映了处于间皮瘤风险中的人群。结果显示了居民流动性对地理风险估计的影响，以及确认疾病潜伏期的重要性。进行了仿真研究以研究卷积MMM的特性。通过敏感性分析评估卷积MMM结果的稳健性。以及确认疾病潜伏期的重要性。进行了仿真研究以研究卷积MMM的特性。通过敏感性分析评估卷积MMM结果的稳健性。以及确认疾病潜伏期的重要性。进行了仿真研究以研究卷积MMM的特性。通过敏感性分析评估卷积MMM结果的稳健性。