The Team

Prof. Elena Kulinskaya
Aviva Chair in Statistics, UEA
Email: e.kulinskaya@uea.ac.uk Tel: +44 (0)1603 592692
Research interests: meta-analysis and evidence synthesis, statistical methods for Big Data analysis, actuarial  and medical statistics.

Elena Kulinskaya is Professor in Statistics (Aviva Chair in Statistics) at the University of East Anglia in Norwich. Prof Kulinskaya is an academic statistician with strong research interests in meta-analysis and research synthesis, statistical methods for Big Data, and their applications in insurance, health and environmental sciences. She is the Principal Investigator on the IFoA-ARC  funded research grant on Use Of Big Health And Actuarial Data For Understanding Longevity And Morbidity Risks. She is also working on methodology for  Big Data Analytics in the ESRC funded Business and Local Government Data Research Centre (BLG DRC).

Dr. Beatriz de la Iglesia
Senior Lecturer, UEA
Email: b.iglesia@uea.ac.uk Tel:  +44 (0)1603 592961
Research interests: data mining algorithm development and application of data mining techniques ranging from financial data to biological and medical data.

Beatriz de la Iglesia is a data mining researcher with experience of health care data analysis. She has worked, among other themes, on the analysis of primary care datasets for cardiovascular disease risk evaluation; on text mining of gastroenterology procedural reports to identify key success indicators and on  linking data in the secondary care setting in order to create patient-centric databases suitable for clinical research.  She has experience of developing new data mining algorithms using optimisation techniques and has over 40 peer reviewed publications.

Prof. Nicholas Steel
Clinical Professor in Public Health, UEA
Email: n.steel@uea.ac.uk Tel:  +44 (0)1603 59 1161
Research interests: measuring health care quality in the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing, assessing the applicability of NICE guidelines to primary care, managing referrals in general practice, and evaluating local and national effects of UK quality improvement initiatives, including the UK Quality and Outcomes Framework for general practices.

Nick Steel is Professor in Public Health at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, and his current research includes a NIHR funded trial of goal setting with high risk patients in primary care, large population cohorts including the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing and primary care databases (THIN and CPRD), and the Global Burden of Disease Study in England

Prof. Ruth Hancock
Professor-Economics of Health & Welfare, Norwich Medical School, UEA
Email: r.hancock@uea.ac.uk Tel:  +44 (0)1603 59 1107
Research interests:  economic, health and social policy implications of individual and population ageing with a particular focus on financial provision for later life and provision for long-term care needs.

Ruth Hancock is a Professor in Economics of Health and Welfare at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, and her research interests are in the economic, health and social policy implications of individual and population ageing with a particular focus on financial provision for later life and provision for long-term care needs. Ruth has 10 years of experience as a goverment economist in the (then) Department of Health and Social Security and a period in economic consultancy.

Dr. Dmitry Pshezhetskiy
Senior Research Fellow/Honorary Senior Lecturer, Norwich Medical School, UEA
Email: d.pshezhetskiy@uea.ac.uk
Research interests:  epigenetic diagnostic markers of cancer progression in prostate, colorectal and ovarian cancer; developing new nanoparticle-based cancer therapies that allow effective and safe treatment of prostate and breast cancers; investigating oncogene/cytokine signalling in tumour microenvironment.

Dmitry Pshezhetskiy has MSc in Chemistry and PhD in Biology. He is involved in cancer research at UEA and NNUH. He is interested in the new prostate cancer nanoparticle based therapies to replace or reduce traditional chemotherapy, and in investigating the epigenetic mechanisms of cancer development that may provide a basis for new tests for cancer diagnosis and prognosis. At the same time, he is undergoing clinical training in primary care.

Mr. Nigel Wright
Actuary, the Life Risk Analytics team, Aviva
Email: nigel.r.wright@aviva.com

Nigel Wright is an actuary working in the Life Data Science team within Aviva and is an Honorary Senior Lecturer at UEA.  He has worked with UEA since 2010 and is currently involved with the Big Health Actuarial Data project.

Ms. Sarah Allen
Senior Data Analyst, the Life Risk Analytics team, Aviva
Email: sarah.allen@aviva.com

Sarah Allen has many years of experience working on data analytics in the insurance industry.  She currently works for Aviva in their Life Data Science team.  She has worked with UEA since 2011, analysing Primary Care data and is currently supporting the Big Health Actuarial Data project.

Dr. Ilyas Bakbergenuly
Senior Research Associate, UEA
Research interests: meta-analysis, statistical methods, survival analysis, actuarial statistics.

Ilyas Bakbergenuly  is a postdoctoral researcher in statistics, based at the School of Computing Sciences at the University of East Anglia. His work is funded by ARC grant on  Big Health and Actuarial Data. His research includes computational aspects of Big data handling, selection and analysis, as well as statistical modelling of longevity. Ilyas Bakbergenuly completed a BSc in Mathematics with Statistics and a PhD in Statistics at the University of East Anglia, United Kingdom.

Dr. Lisanne Gitsels
Senior Research Associate, UEA
Research interests: biostatistics, longitudinal data analysis, survival analysis, medical data, and care provision data.

Lisanne Gitsels is a postdoctoral researcher in statistics, based at the School of Computing Sciences at the University of East Anglia. Her work is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) through the Business and Local Government Data Research Centre (BLG DRC), where she contributes to the research streams ‘Methodologies for big data analytics’ and ‘Support for vulnerable people’. She is also involved in research on longevity using primary care data (THIN database) and contributes to the IFoA-ARC funded research on Big Health and Actuarial Data. Lisanne Gitsels completed a BSc in Economics at the University College Roosevelt, the Netherlands, an MSc in Epidemiology at the University College London, United Kingdom, and a PhD in Statistics at the University of East Anglia, United Kingdom.

Mr. Hussein M Wahedally
Postgraduate research student, UEA
Email: m.wahedally@uea.ac.uk
Research interests: actuarial and medical statistics, survival analysis, mortality/longevity risk modelling, big health data analysis, joint replacements
Dates: October 2012 - December 2018
PhD project:  Understanding longevity risks from hip replacement

Hussein Wahedally was a post-graduate research student at the University of East Anglia. His research project was funded by the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries. He completed his BSc in Actuarial Science and a PhD in Statistics at the University of East Anglia, United Kingdom. His research involved the use of primary care data (THIN database) for development of survival models for hip replacement procedures and statistical modelling of mortality risks. Hussein has now moved on to a new role in Royal College of Surgeons in London.

Mrs. Padma Chutoo
Postgraduate research student, UEA
Email: p.chutoo@uea.ac.uk
Research interests: applied statistics, health statistics, risk management and insurance
Start date: 01 April 2017
PhD project: Stroke Mortality and Morbidity in the United Kingdom

Padma Chutoo is currently a PhD student at the University of East Anglia from 1st April 2017. She completed her Bachelor degree in Statistics with Computer Science in 2011 at the University of Mauritius and her Masters in Actuarial Science in 2012 at University of Southampton, UK . In 2013 - 2017, she worked as a lecturer in the fields of Statistics and Actuarial Science at the University of Mauritius. 

Mrs. Nurunnahar Akter
Postgraduate research student, UEA
Email: n.akter@uea.ac.uk
Research interests: survival analysis, medical statistics, mathematical modelling in medicine and actuarial statistics
Start date: 01 October 2017
PhD project: Hormone replacement therapy and its impact on morbidity and longevity

Nurunnahar Akter is a Post-Graduate Research student at the University of East Anglia from 01 October 2017.  Before joining UEA, she worked as a Research Assistant on Clinical Data Analysis at the College of Engineering, Mathematics, and Physical Sciences of University of Exeter.

Nurunnahar completed her BSc in Mathematics in 2005 and MSc in Pure Mathematics in 2007 from the University of Dhaka, Bangladesh with First Class in all. After completing her Masters, Nurunnahar worked as a lecturer at the dept. of Computer Science and Engineering, Darul Ihsan University for one year and at the Department of Mathematics, Dhaka City College for more than five years. She also worked as an assistant professor at Dhaka City College nearly two years. In 2016, Nurunnahar has received her second Masters in Mathematical Medicine and Biology from the University of Nottingham, UK

Mr. Njabulo Ncube
Postgraduate research student, UEA
Email: n.ncube@uea.ac.uk
Research interests: longevity risk, health statistics, risk theory, survival analysis and social security statistical and actuarial dynamics
Start date: 01 October 2017
PhD project:  Type II Diabetes and its impact on morbidity and longevity

Njabulo Ncube is a Post-Graduate Research student at University of East Anglia. He has more than 13 years of work experience in social security. He joined the National Social Security Authority, Zimbabwe, in 2003 as an ICT Graduate Management Trainee and moved up the ranks to work as a Statistician in 2005. He then joined the University of East Anglia in 2017 as a Post-Graduate Research Student.

Njabulo Ncube received a BSc in Computer Science and Statistics from the University of Zimbabwe in 2002 and an MSc in Actuarial Science from the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, in 2013.