Recursive partitioning of resistant mutations for longitudinal markers based on a U-type score

Development of human immunodeficiency virus resistance mutations is a major cause of failure of antiretroviral treatment.We develop a recursive partitioning method to correlate high-dimensional viral sequences with repeatedly measured outcomes.The splitting criterion of this procedure is based on a class of U-type score statistics.The proposed method is flexible enough to apply to a broad range of problems involving longitudinal outcomes.Simulation studies are performed to explore the finite-sample properties of the proposed method, which is also illustrated through analysis of data collected in 3 phase II clinical trials testing the antiretroviral drug efavirenz.