Fig 1.
Directed acyclic graph (DAG) based on existing evidence and expert knowledge to estimate beliefs by the research team about the total effect of age at neutering in bitches on early-onset UI diagnosis.
Table 1.
Definition and categorisation of demographic and clinical data extracted from the electronic health records of early-onset UI (< 8.5 years) case and control bitches attending primary-care veterinary practices in the VetCompass™ Programme in the UK (n = 1500).
Table 2.
Specification and emulation of target trial to estimate the causal effect of early compared with later age at neutering on a subsequent outcome of early-onset UI diagnosis.
Table 3.
Early neutering (3 to < 7 months) count (%) (n = 612) and later neutering (≥ 7 to ≤ 18 months) count (%) (n = 888) for categorical variables recorded in early-onset UI (< 8.5 years) case and control bitches attending primary-care veterinary practices in the VetCompass™ Programme in the UK.
Individual chronic comorbidities were included if at least 8 bitches were affected overall.
Fig 2.
Standardised mean differences (SMD) before and after applying inverse probability weighting.
The “observed” method represents the absolute SMD of the prespecified covariates pre-weighting and the “final_weights” the absolute SMD post-weighting.