A Tutorial for Propensity Score Weighting for Moderation Analysis With Categorical Variables: An Application Examining Smoking Disparities Among Sexual Minority Adults.

Objective: To provide step-by-step guidance and STATA and R code for using propensity score (PS) weighting to estimate moderation effects with categorical variables.

Research Design: Tutorial illustrating the key steps for estimating and testing moderation using observational data. Steps include: (1) examining covariate overlap across treatment groups within levels of the moderator; (2) estimating the PS weights; (3) evaluating whether PS weights improved covariate balance; (4) estimating moderated treatment effects; and (5) assessing the sensitivity of findings to unobserved confounding.

Altered regulation of cardiac ankyrin repeat protein in heart failure.

Background: Left ventricular assist devices (LVADs) have revolutionized and improved the care of the sickest heart failure (HF) patients, and it is imperative that they receive appropriate ventricular unloading. Assessing this critical parameter with current methodologies (labs, imaging) is usually suboptimal in this patient population. Hence it is imperative to elucidate the molecular underpinnings involved in ventricular unloading.