Week 5, Term 2, Wednesday 11th February at Oculus.
Prof. Rhiannon Owen
Professor Rhiannon Owen is an internationally recognised applied statistical methodologist, whose research has informed healthcare policy and practice.
Her research focuses on the development and application of statistical methods for the analysis of population-scale, linked electronic health records. She has extensive experience of national healthcare decision-making for the NHS as a long-standing member of the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) Technology Appraisal Committee.
Rhiannon has extensive experience of cross-sector collaboration including as a statistical consultant. She has provided methodological and strategic advice to the global pharmaceutical industry and international health technology assessment agencies. Rhiannon graduated with a BSc in Mathematics and Sports Science from Loughborough University. She completed an MSc and PhD in Medical Statistics from the University of Leicester, funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Research Methods Fellowship and NIHR Doctoral Research Fellowship. She was previously a Research Associate, Assistant Professor, and Associate Professor in Biostatistics at the University of Leicester, and Associate Professor in Statistics at Swansea University. She is currently Professor of Statistics at Swansea University Medical School, and Health and Care Research Wales (HCRW) Senior Research Leader.
Dr. David Harley
Dr David Hartley is a senior leader in pharmaceutical and consumer healthcare analytics with deep expertise in statistical modelling, quantitative decision science and the application of advanced analytics across Research & Development, commercial strategy and portfolio management. As founder of DSH Advisory and former Vice President of R&D Portfolio Finance at GSK, he has led major initiatives in statistical pipeline valuation, the modelling of drug and vaccine development success probabilities and evidence-based portfolio optimisation. He has a PhD in Statistics from the University of Warwick and remains academically active, focussing his research on Bayesian expert judgement and the integration of statistical theory into real-world decision processes, alongside pursuing endurance challenges as an accomplished ultra-marathon runner.
Dr. Leo Westbury
Leo has worked as a statistician at the MRC Lifecourse Epidemiology Centre since 2013. He studied Mathematical Sciences at the University of Bath and then an MSc in Statistics at the University of Warwick.
His research focus is on the lifecourse epidemiology of musculoskeletal ageing. This involves implementing statistical methods to explore determinants and health-related consequences of poor or declining musculoskeletal health in older age. Other research areas include: exploring determinants of bone microarchitecture in the Global Longitudinal Study of Osteoporosis in Women; understanding risk factors for low physical performance, sarcopenia and osteoporosis in the Hertfordshire Cohort Study and the 1946 British Birth Cohort; and implementing complex statistical techniques to analyse change over multiple time-points.
His role also involves teaching within the Faculty of Social Sciences and the Faculty of Medicine and disseminating research findings at national and international conferences.
