When there is a lack of head-to-head randomized controlled trials between two interventions of interest, indirect comparison methods can be employed to estimate their relative treatment effects. Matching-adjusted indirect comparison (MAIC) is a population-adjusted indirect comparison method that utilizes a weighting approach. Unanchored MAIC is particularly applicable in scenarios where a common control group between the two interventions is not available. This article introduces the background and mathematical theory of unanchored MAIC, along with a demonstration of the operational steps and interpretation of results through an application example.
