error message-Hessian of posterior density is non positive definite during search

From: Vincenzo di Iorio Date: February 26, 2010 technical Source: cognigen.com
On behalf of Amit Taneja: Dear Nonmem users, I have been trying to fit a linear logistic model to a set of binary response data in nonmem6. However, nonmem terminates and gives the following message. My dataset has 36 subjects and 5 pd sample points per subject. On the other hand, a logistic emax model fits the data well and consistently. I even get the covariance step. One would expect a linear model to fit more easily than an emax model? My control stream is provided below as is a sample of the dataset, and the output file is enclosed. I would appreciate your inputs on resolving this vexing issue. Thanks Amit Taneja Pharmacology Leiden Amsterdam Center for Drug Research Leiden Netherlands ------------------ Relevant part of output file (Error message) MONITORING OF SEARCH: 0HESSIAN OF POSTERIOR DENSITY IS NON-POSITIVE-DEFINITE DURING SEARCH ---------------------------------- $PROB $INPUT ID TIME PDB=DV PD CAUC MDV EVID DGRP $DATA GpdV_od.csv IGNORE $PRED ;in this model we fit a linear model in the logit space ; Baseline Probabilities PLAC = THETA(1) ; Drug Conc effect Emax model, assuming gamma = 1 SLOP = THETA(2) ;EC50 = THETA(3) DRUG = SLOP*CAUC ; Logit A = DRUG + PLAC + ETA(1) ; ; the term exp(drug+plac+eta) is expressed as A P = EXP(A)/1+EXP(A) ;PB0 = P0/(1+P0) ; Probability of parameter=0 ; e**x/1+e**x; x=logit function ;PB1 = 1-PB0 ; probability of parameter=1 ;IF (DV.EQ.0) PB = PB0 ;IF (DV.EQ.1) PB = PB1 Y = -2*PDB*A-2*LOG(1-P) $THETA (1,157.9) ; PLAC Theta(1) (1,10) ; SLOP Theta(2) ; EC50 EPER 1 Theta(3) ;15.85 ; L0 Theta(4) $OMEGA 1 $ESTIM METHOD=COND LAPLACIAN -2LL $COV MAT=R $TABLE ID TIME P PD CAUC PLAC SLOP MDV EVID DGRP NOPRINT ONEHEADER FILE=Gp_lin15.tab # SAMPLE OF THE INPUT DATASET ID TIME PDB PD CAUC MDV EVID DGRP CONC 1 0 0 5.328576 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 0.499059 0 0 0 0 0 1 2 1 22.8096 0 0 0 0 0 1 3 0 0.299475 0 0 0 0 0 1 4 0 0.333036 0 0 0 0 0 8 0 0 2.168496 0 0 0 100 0 8 1 1 111.4464 1131.1 0 0 100 359.43 8 2 1 54.94748 3638.7 0 0 100 541.01 8 3 1 222.75 6887.6 0 0 100 636.91 8 4 1 222.75 10529.2 0 0 100 688.48 15 0 0 17.21501 0 0 0 100 0 15 1 1 65.75828 1131.1 0 0 100 356.33 15 2 1 222.75 3638.7 0 0 100 541 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Vincenzo Luca Di Iorio Consultant PME User support - GSK R&D Limited ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----------------------------------------------------------- This e-mail was sent by GlaxoSmithKline Services Unlimited (registered in England and Wales No. 1047315), which is a member of the GlaxoSmithKline group of companies. The registered address of GlaxoSmithKline Services Unlimited is 980 Great West Road, Brentford, Middlesex TW8 9GS.