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Dr Darsy Darssan

Lecturer - Biostatistics

School of Public Health
Faculty of Medicine
d.darssan@uq.edu.au
+61 7 336 55272

Overview

Dr Darsy Darssan is an Accredited Professional Statistician® (PStat®) and a Fellow of Higher Education Academy (FHEA). He obtained three degrees in Statistics at mathematical sciences schools of three different universities: a Bachelor of Science with Honours in 2005 at University of Jaffna, a Master of Applied Science in 2008 at RMIT University and a Doctor of Philosophy in 2014 at Queensland University of Technology.

While doing his two years full time traditional face-to-face master degree, Darsy worked as a part-time Statistician at Australian Council for Educational Research for a year.

Between the two bouts of postgraduate studies, Darsy worked for two years: as a Statistician at the University of New South Wales for a year and another year as an Associate Research Fellow in Applied Statistics at the University of Wollongong.

While doing the highest degree in Statistics Darsy worked as a sessional academic, contributed to teaching introductory statistics to various cohorts of first-year undergraduate students. Upon completion of the doctoral degree, Darsy moved to the University of Liverpool in the UK to do his Postdoctoral research in Biostatistics. Darsy returned home in late 2015 and worked as a Biostatistician at The University of Queensland for three years before taking the current position.

Career Statistician:

As a career statistician, Darsy is interested in developing or extending statistical methodologies to solve problems that arise in real-world data analysis and data collection in Biomedical research.

Service Statistician:

Darsy has experience working as a service statistician. He mainly worked on clinical trials where he was involved in study designs, randomisation, protocols development, statistical analysis plans, final statistical reports. He actively participated in data safety monitoring boards. Darsy provided statistical service to Biologists, Rheumatologists, Ophthalmologists, Nephrologist, Endocrinologist and Health Service Researchers.

Teaching @ UQ:

Post-graduate teaching

Introduction to Biostatistics (PUBH7630)

Under-graduate teaching

Health Data Analysis (PUBH2007)

Research Interests

  • Geospatial Health Data Modeling
    Identify risk factors and quantify disease risk that explains the variation in space and time
  • Research in Biostatistics/Higher Education
    Continuous progressive assessments. Peer feedback. Assessment for learning.

Research Impacts

I conduct research in statistical methodologies that has straightforward application in health research. My research provides steps and guidelines on advanced statistical methods for health researchers to conduct quality research.

Qualifications

  • Bachelor of Science, University of Jaffna
  • Master of Applied Science, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology
  • Doctor of Philosophy, Queensland University of Technology

Publications

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Grants

View all Grants

Supervision

View all Supervision

Available Projects

  • Model-based disease mapping

    In public health and epidemiology, understanding population-based human diseases on counts of observed cases at different residential areas with relevant characteristics such as age distribution, socioeconomic status, and environmental exposure is essential to provide better patient care and support. Such understanding involves estimating the disease risk in a small geographic area on a spatial domain of interest. Often too low observed cases in some small geographical areas will provide unreliable disease risk estimation. Unreliable estimates raise the question of whether the underlying disease risk of a geographical location is much higher or lower than the rest. This project will answer the question above through rigorous statistical modelling. The models will use the information from the neighbouring observations at various dimensions to better predict disease risk. The underlying philosophy is known as the first law of geostatistics – “everything is related to everything else, but near things are more related”.

    For this research, based on individual research interests, the potential future PhD student can choose a data set from Australian children, overall health survey, women’s health, birth cohort, kidney disease, the study of health and aging, and large-scale biomedical databases. The datasets mentioned above are available for research, but some will need permission to access them. Based on the individual student interest in a particular disease and dataset, we will submit an expression of interest to the data custodians.

    As a principal advisor, I provide many benefits to new PhD students. I am readily available to listen more, care more, closely observe student progress and act quickly as necessary. The advisory team will also have a professor-level co-advisor who will bring disease-specific knowledge to the research. Once established, possibly from the second year of the candidature, the student will have the opportunity to lead the project.

    Potential future PhD students will need to contact me via email, attend a meeting, write a proposal, and apply to the subsequent UQGSS scholarship round.

  • Experiments in higher education

    You will design and conduct a controlled trial in undergraduate and postgraduate teaching. High interest in the design of experiments, survey design, psychometrics and innovative higher education is essential.

    As a principal advisor, I provide many benefits to new PhD students. I am readily available to listen more, care more, closely observe student progress and act quickly as necessary. The advisory team will also have a professor-level co-advisor who will bring expertise in higher education research. Once established, possibly from the second year of the candidature, you will have the opportunity to lead the project.

    Potential future PhD students will need to contact me via email, attend a meeting, write a proposal, and apply to the subsequent UQGSS scholarship round.

View all Available Projects

Publications

Featured Publications

Journal Article

Conference Publication

Grants (Administered at UQ)

PhD and MPhil Supervision

Current Supervision

Possible Research Projects

Note for students: The possible research projects listed on this page may not be comprehensive or up to date. Always feel free to contact the staff for more information, and also with your own research ideas.

  • Model-based disease mapping

    In public health and epidemiology, understanding population-based human diseases on counts of observed cases at different residential areas with relevant characteristics such as age distribution, socioeconomic status, and environmental exposure is essential to provide better patient care and support. Such understanding involves estimating the disease risk in a small geographic area on a spatial domain of interest. Often too low observed cases in some small geographical areas will provide unreliable disease risk estimation. Unreliable estimates raise the question of whether the underlying disease risk of a geographical location is much higher or lower than the rest. This project will answer the question above through rigorous statistical modelling. The models will use the information from the neighbouring observations at various dimensions to better predict disease risk. The underlying philosophy is known as the first law of geostatistics – “everything is related to everything else, but near things are more related”.

    For this research, based on individual research interests, the potential future PhD student can choose a data set from Australian children, overall health survey, women’s health, birth cohort, kidney disease, the study of health and aging, and large-scale biomedical databases. The datasets mentioned above are available for research, but some will need permission to access them. Based on the individual student interest in a particular disease and dataset, we will submit an expression of interest to the data custodians.

    As a principal advisor, I provide many benefits to new PhD students. I am readily available to listen more, care more, closely observe student progress and act quickly as necessary. The advisory team will also have a professor-level co-advisor who will bring disease-specific knowledge to the research. Once established, possibly from the second year of the candidature, the student will have the opportunity to lead the project.

    Potential future PhD students will need to contact me via email, attend a meeting, write a proposal, and apply to the subsequent UQGSS scholarship round.

  • Experiments in higher education

    You will design and conduct a controlled trial in undergraduate and postgraduate teaching. High interest in the design of experiments, survey design, psychometrics and innovative higher education is essential.

    As a principal advisor, I provide many benefits to new PhD students. I am readily available to listen more, care more, closely observe student progress and act quickly as necessary. The advisory team will also have a professor-level co-advisor who will bring expertise in higher education research. Once established, possibly from the second year of the candidature, you will have the opportunity to lead the project.

    Potential future PhD students will need to contact me via email, attend a meeting, write a proposal, and apply to the subsequent UQGSS scholarship round.

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Links

ResearcherID: P-5575-2017

ORCID: 0000-0001-7050-9150

Scopus ID: 56080456300

Google Scholar ID: u0VcDtIAAAAJ

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