Patient-level simulation model

A patient-level simulation is a type of model in which outcomes are estimated for individual patients one at a time. In this model, the determination of outcomes is usually based on random (stochastic) selection of patients: a large number of patients are required to be simulated in order to estimate the mean outcomes (and their distribution) for the population considered in the analysis. Benefits of this type of model over cohort models are that it allows individual patient histories to be recorded, the model can capture (first-order) heterogeneity in the patient population, and they are often considered more intuitive or more flexible. One drawback may be the additional computational requirements for the model to run, particularly when running sensitivity analyses.
Also, see micro-simulation model.