Why Match? Matched Case-Control Studies

Abstract

Individually matched case-control study designs are common in public health and medicine, and conditional logistic regression in a parametric statistical model is the tool most commonly used to analyze these studies. In an individually matched case-control study, the population of interest is identified, and cases are randomly sampled. Each of these cases is then matched to one or more controls based on a variable (or variables) believed to be a confounder. The main potential benefit of matching in case-control studies is a gain in efficiency, not the elimination of confounding. Therefore, when are these study designs truly beneficial?