Thriving in the data driven HEALTH

Hello world !!!

Welcome to my personal blog where I love to share what I’m learning and researching through my PhD and also as a Biostatistician (at University of Sydney).

I always love to improve the world wide quality of living through data. But you may wonder how? Simple answer is, If we want to know what’s really happening around us, we have to learn statistics.

Here I will share my learning and the experience which I’m gathering along my journey. I really hope this will also help you in your data related endeavors.

Well then this is my learning curve !!!

Let’s start digging.

Linkedin Snap shot of who am I

Researchgate Profile of what I’m researching

S. Sandun M. Silva

S. Sandun M. Silva

Biostatistician

The University of Sydney

Biography

I’m a statistician specialized in biostatistics and data science.

I’m currently working as a biostatistician at National Health Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Clinical Trial Center, University of Sydney.

I have completed my bachelor’s degree in Statistics at University of Colombo, Sri Lanka. After a year of working as a data analyst/scientist in Sri Lanka, I was offered a full scholarship from Department of Health Science and Biostatistics at Swinburne University of Technology Australia to follow a Ph.D. in Statistics (STA90001) in the scope of Health Science (DR-HTHSCI), under the supervision of Prof. Denny Meyer and Dr. Madawa W. Jayawardana.

My Ph.D. project was named as “Innovative Statistical Methods to Model and Evaluate Physical Activity Programs Engagement”, which comprises statistical and machine learning models to model mHealth physical activity programs. This Ph.D. project was done in collaboration with a US based world leading wellbeing program which is known as “Virgin Pulse Global Challenge”. The findings of the Ph.D. were well published in leading academic journals and international conferences.

During my Ph.D., I have consulted over 1000 students in advanced statistical modelling, time series analysis, machine learning, business forecasting and predictive analytics at three ranking universities namely Monash University, Melbourne University (MBS) and Swinburne University of Technology, with an overall rating of 4.7 out of 5.

I have worked with Department of Transport, Victoria and Peter MacCallum Cancer Research Centre, Melbourne on various studies to solve real world problems. The findings of these studies have been published in leading academic journals.

I enjoy myself working on real world health problems using data and statistics.

Download my resumé.

Interests
  • Statistics/ Biostatistics
  • Data Science
  • Bioinformatics
Education
  • Ph.D. in Statistics, 2021

    Swinburne University of Technology

  • B.Sc. in Statistics, 2016

    University of Colombo

Experience

 
 
 
 
 
The University of Sydney (NHMRC Clinical Trial center)
Biostatistician
Dec 2020 – Present Sydney, Australia

Apply and develop statistical methods to problems arising from clinical and biological research.

Perform statistical analysis of clinical trials and associated data (meta-analyses, data linkage and genome wide association studies) using various statistical packages.

Collaborating with clinical trials research to improve health care practice.

 
 
 
 
 
Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre
Researcher (Research collaboration)
Sep 2020 – Present Melbourne, Australia

Investigating risk factors associated with suicide in adolescents and young adults (AYA) with cancer Responsibilities include:

  • Analysing
  • Modelling
  • Publishing
 
 
 
 
 
The University of Melbourne
Teaching Associate
Jan 2020 – May 2020 Melbourne, Australia
Master of Business analytics MBusA
 
 
 
 
 
Monash University
Teaching Associate
Aug 2019 – Oct 2020 Melbourne, Australia

Units include:

  • Advanced Statistical Modelling ETC3580
  • Business Forecasting ETF 3231 ETF5231
  • Business Statistics ETF1100
  • Data Visualisation & Analytics ETX2250 ETF5922
  • Quantitative methods for risk analysis ETF5952
 
 
 
 
 
VicRoads
Quantitative Researcher
Aug 2019 – Feb 2020 Melbourne, Australia

Funded by a VicRoads tender, within the Centre for Mental Health, which sits in the Health and Biostatistics department under Swinburne Research. This project has established the predictive value of offence data as a proxy measure of future crash risk and identified the important characteristics, license and offence histories of drivers with high future fatal and serious injury crash risk Responsibilities include:

  • Analysing
  • Modelling
  • Publishing
 
 
 
 
 
Swinburne University of Technology
Teaching Associate
Aug 2017 – Nov 2019 Melbourne, Australia
  • Business Analytics INF30030
  • Data Mining course STA30004

Skills

R

100%

Statistics

100%

SAS
SAS

50%

powerbi
Power Bi

80%

python
Python

40%

shiny
Shiny

80%

Accomplish­ments

Coursera
Neural Networks and Deep Learning
See certificate
Swinburne University Postgraduate Research Award
For exceptional research potential undertaking doctoral studies

Contact