Victorian Centre for Biostatistics (ViCBiostat)

About ViCBiostat

The Victorian Centre for Biostatistics (ViCBiostat) aims to build the Australian biostatistical workforce and future leaders through a program of methodological research embedded in significant collaborative health and medical research.

The centre is a collaboration between the Murdoch Children's Research Institute, Monash University and the University of Melbourne; with senior, mid-career and postdoctoral biostatisticians and PhD students from each institution. It provides a hub for methodological research through regular work-in-progress seminars, as well as dedicated support for the professional development of postdoctoral biostatisticians and PhD students.

At MCRI, ViCBiostat activity is embedded within the Clinical Epidemiology & Biostatistics (CEBU), which provides essential input to a wide range of research projects and groups at the Melbourne Children’s campus. It is now a collaborative network with research supported by a range of grants and centre activities funded by income from short courses and workshops.

The Centre is led by Professor John Carlin and was established in 2012 by a Centre of Research Excellence grant from the National Health & Medical Research Council (NHMRC), with funding for five years.

Seminars and Summer School

Members of the wider biostatistics and research community are welcome to attend the monthly invited seminar presentations from national and international speakers, as well as our flagship Summer School series of short courses. 

To join our seminar mailing list, or for any other enquiries, please contact us.

About Biostatistics

Biostatistics is a discipline of great importance to health research, encompassing the vital methods needed to design sound health research studies and lead the analysis and interpretation of data arising from such studies. In the modern era, health research is data-intensive and statistical expertise is critical to extracting knowledge from the growing volume of data being collected.

However, the discipline of biostatistics is relatively underdeveloped in Australia, lacking major centres of sufficient critical mass to foster the development of early career statisticians, and in particular to support advanced training and discipline leadership through methodological research programs.

Our publications

Publications are available on the ViCBiostat website.

Prof John Carlin

John Carlin is a senior researcher in biostatistics, formerly head of CEBU, who led the NHMRC grant that established the Victorian Centre for Biostatistics (ViCBiostat) in 2012. He continues to play a leadership role in the centre, with research interests spanning numerous topics in methods for handling missing data, causal inference, complex randomised trials and improving the teaching and practice of biostatistical methods.

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Prof Margarita Moreno Betancur

Margarita Moreno-Betancur is co-Director of CEBU. She joined ViCBiostat as a post-doctoral researcher in 2014 and has been in the leadership team since 2016. She leads a program of research aiming to develop, disseminate and promote modern causal thinking and related methods in health research, with strands including mediation analysis, causal machine learning and missing data.

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Prof Katherine Lee

Katherine Lee is co-Director of CEBU and Associate Director: Biostatistics in the Melbourne Children’s Trials Centre. She joined the ViCBiostat leadership team in 2014 after a brief period as a post-doctoral researcher. Her research interests are in the method of multiple imputation for handling missing data, and more recently adaptive and platform trials.

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Our projects

Our research is guided by the concept of a “methodological and translational pipeline”. Applied biostatistical research is required at multiple levels in order to enable the fruitful application of new statistical methods in health and medical research studies. 

Details of some of our specific research programs can be found at ViCBiostat research projects.

Beyond our research, we develop training programs in biostatistical methods, including specialist PhD training as well as workshops and courses for epidemiologists and other health researchers. The Centre aims to play an active role in the dissemination of sound statistical methods throughout the health research sector.

Its translation activities include a wide range of substantive collaborations in which the biostatistical contribution is critical, and extend beyond that to direct contributions to health policy and health services decision-making.

Collaborations

Co-Chief Investigators at partner institutions (Monash University and University of Melbourne) are:

Professor Andrew Forbes
Head of the Biostatistics Unit in the Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine at Monash University. Since completing a PhD in Statistics at Cornell University (USA) he has been actively engaged in collaborative epidemiological and clinical research projects. His research interests are methods for comparative effectiveness research, assessment of the effects of time-dependent exposures, interrupted time series designs and methodology in clinical trials.

Professor Lyle Gurrin
Biostatistical researcher with the Centre for Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Melbourne School of Population & Global Health, University of Melbourne. He completed a PhD in statistics at the Telethon Institute for Child Health Research in Perth and is the principal investigator of the HealthIron cohort study and chief investigator on projects in asthma, allergy and immunology. His methodological research interests are in methods for longitudinal data and causal analysis in cohort studies.

Professor Julie Simpson
Head of the Biostatistics Unit at the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, The University of Melbourne and Director of the Methods and Implementation Support for Clinical and Health Research (MISCH) Hub. She completed her postgraduate training in statistics at the University of Cambridge (PGrad Dip) and Open University (PhD), UK. Her primary area of research is the bridging of novel statistical and mathematical modelling approaches to inform treatment policy for malaria and her research has generated evidence that has led to revised dosing recommendations for antimalarial regimens and improved sampling designs for antimalarial pharmacokinetic-pharmacodynamic studies.

Professor Rory Wolfe
Biostatistician at Monash University and contributes to a wide range of epidemiological and clinical research studies. He obtained his PhD in statistics from Southampton University (UK), subsequently did research in statistical methodology for longitudinal studies, and maintains methodological interests in missing data in risk prediction models, joint modelling of mortality and cognitive decline, and applications of propensity scoring methods.

Professor Jessica Kasza
Biostatistical researcher in the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. After completing a PhD in 2010 at the University of Adelaide, she spent time at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark. She has been at Monash University since 2013. At Monash, she leads the development of statistical methodology for longitudinal cluster randomised trials, including the stepped wedge and cluster cross-over designs, with a current focus on the development of “incomplete” stepped wedge designs. She also has interests in the comparison of healthcare providers and in causal inference. In addition, Professor Kasza is Vice-President of the Statistical Society of Australia, and in that role is keen to ensure that the Australian statistical community is diverse, welcoming, and inclusive.

For more information please see ViCBiostat people.

Contact us

Victorian Centre for Biostatistics (ViCBiostat)
Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics Unit
Murdoch Children's Research Institute
The Royal Children's Hospital
50 Flemington Road
Parkville VIC 3052
Australia

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