Strong consistency of a nonparametric estimator of the survival function with doubly censored data (Q1094033)

A double censoring mechanism is such that each variable X in the sample is observable if and only if X is within the observation interval [Z,Y]. Otherwise, we can only determine whether X is less than Z or greater than Y and observe Z or Y correspondingly. This kind of censoring occurs often in collecting lifetime data. Our problem is to estimate the survival function of X, \(S_ X(t)=P[X>t]\), from a doubly censored sample, where X is assumed to be independent of the random interval [Z,Y]. We establish sufficient conditions for which \(S_ X(t)\) is identifiable and then prove the strong consistency of the self-consistent estimator \(\hat S_ X(t)\) for \(S_ X(t)\). This investigation generalizes the results available for the right censored data.