In statistics, the logrank test (sometimes called the MantelCox test) is a hypothesis test to compare the survival distributions

of two samples. It is a nonparametric test and appropriate to use when the data are right skewed and censored (technically, the censoring must be non-informative). It is widely used in clinical trials to establish the efficacy of a new treatment compared to a control treatment when the measurement is the time to event (such as the time from initial treatment to a heart attack).

Definition
The logrank test statistic compares estimates of the hazard functions of the two groups at each observed event time. It is constructed by computing the observed and expected number of events in one of the groups at each observed event time and then adding these to obtain an overall summary across all time points where there is an event. Let j = 1, ..., J be the distinct times of observed events in either group. For each time j, let N1j and N2j be the number of subjects "at risk" (have not yet had an event or been censored) at the start of period j in the groups respectively. Let Nj = N1j + N2j. Let O1j and O2j be the observed number of events in the groups respectively at time j, and define Oj = O1j + O2j. Given that Oj events happened across both groups at time j, under the null hypothesis (of the two groups having identical survival and hazard functions) O1j has the hypergeometric distribution with parameters Nj, N1j, and Oj. This distribution has expected value variance . and

The logrank statistic compares each O1j to its expectation E1j under the null hypothesis and is defined as

Comparing survival curves of two groups using the log rank test
Comparison of two survival curves can be done using a statistical hypothesis test called the log rank test. It is used to test the null hypothesis that there is no difference between the population survival curves (i.e. the probability of an event occurring at any time point is the same for each population). The test statistic is calculated as follows:

Where the O1 and O2 are the total numbers of observed events in groups 1 and 2, respectively, and E1 and E2 the total numbers of expected events. The total expected number of events for a group is the sum of the expected number of events at the time of each event. The expected number of events at the time of an event can be calculated as the risk for death at that time multiplied by the number alive in the group. Under the null hypothesis, the risk of death (number of deaths/number alive) can be calculated from the combined data for both groups. Table 3 shows the calculation of the expected number of deaths for treatment group 2 for the example data. For example, at the beginning of day 4 when the third death (event 3) takes place, there are 13 patients still alive. One dies, giving a risk for death of 1/13 = 0.077. Six of the 13 patients are from treatment group 2, and therefore the expected number of deaths is given by 6 0.077 = 0.46 at event 3. The total expected number of events for group 2 is calculated as:
Calculations for the log-rank test to compare treatments for the data in Table 1 Number known to Expected number Survival Number Risk for Treatment Deaths be alive from of events in time known to be death group (di) treatment group 2 treatment group 2 (days) alive (ri) (di/ri) (r2i) (E2i)

0 1 1 4 5 6+ 8 9 9+ 12 2 2 2 2 2 1 2 2 1 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 1 1 0 1 1 0 1 1/13 = 0.077 1/12 = 0.083 0/11 = 0 1/10 = 0.100 1/9 = 0.111 0/8 = 0 1/7 = 0.143 6 5 4 3 3 2 1 6 0.077 = 0.46 5 0.083 = 0.42 4 0 = 0.00 3 0.100 = 0.30 3 0.111 = 0.33 2 0 = 0.00 1 0.143 = 0.14 15 2 2/15 = 0.133 8 8 0.133 = 1.07

Survival time (days) 15+ 22 25+ 37 55 72+

Number known to Expected number Number Risk for Treatment Deaths be alive from of events in known to be death group (di) treatment group 2 treatment group 2 alive (ri) (di/ri) (r2i) (E2i) 1 2 1 1 1 1 E2 = 2.92 6 5 4 3 2 0 1 0 1 1 0/6 = 0 1/5 = 0.200 0/4 = 0 1/3 = 0.333 1/2 = 0.500 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 = 0.00 1 0.200 = 0.20 0 0 = 0.00 0 0 = 0.00 0 0 = 0.00

Where r2i is the number alive from group 2 at the time of event i. E1 can be calculated as n - E2, where n is the total number of events. The test statistic is compared with a 2 distribution with 1 degree of freedom. It is a simplified version of a statistic that is often calculated in statistical packages [2]. For the data in Table 1, the total number of expected deaths for treatment group 2 is calculated as 2.92 and the total number of observed deaths is 10, giving a total number of expected deaths for treatment group 1 of 10 - 2.92 = 7.08. The value of the test statistic is therefore calculated as follows:

This gives a P value of 0.032, which indicates a significant difference between the population survival curves. An assumption for the log rank test is that of proportional hazards. This is discussed below. Small departures from this assumption, however, do not invalidate the test.

Table 1

Survival time, age and outcome for a group of patients diagnosed with a disease and receiving one of two treatments Patient number Survival time (days) Outcome Treatment Age (years)

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15

1 1 4 5 6 8 9 9 12 15 22 25 37 55 72

Died Died Died Died Unknown Died Survived Died Died Unknown Died Survived Died Died Survived

2 2 2 2 2 1 2 2 1 1 2 1 1 1 1

75 79 85 76 66 75 72 70 71 73 66 73 68 59 61