Muhammad Saiful Islam

muhammad.islam@my.westminster.ac.uk

MUHAMMAD SAIFUL ISLAM

PhD (UK), MSc, BSc (Applied Statistics)
Swansea, United Kingdom.
Mobile: +44 (0)7411866642
Email: m.s.islam@swansea.ac.uk; muhammad.islam@my.westminster.ac.uk
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=66679110&trk=tab_pro
Home Address: 11 York Court, maritime Quarter, Swansea SA1 3XD, UK.

A trained statistician (BSc, MSc, and PhD all in applied statistics) with strong analytical skills and
creativity from academic study combined with practical understanding of the theory, methods and
applications of statistics. I have got the expertise to work with clinical trial, trial database
management, big data, use databases to deal them, employ statistical approaches, software, and
data visualisation techniques to make a meaningful sense of the data. I am interested working in
the areas of Biostatistics, Clinical Trials, Epidemiology, Health and environmental research,
Hospital episode statistics, Population studies, Social care, Climate change, Pollutions,
Econometrics, Market Research, Finance, and general data analyses.

EDUCATION
2009 2014

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD in Applied Statistics): Department of Business

Information Systems, Faculty of Science and Technology, University of
Westminster.
Thesis: Modelling the Impact of Climate Change on Health.
Awarded: February 2014

2013 2014

PgCert SS: Postgraduate Certificate of Special Study, University of

Westminster.

2006 2007

M.Sc. (Applied Statistics) Institute of Statistical Research and Training

(http://www.isrt.ac.bd), University of Dhaka, Dhaka-1000, Bangladesh.
Achieved First Class (7th Position).
Thesis: Simple Linear Regression analysis based on Ranked set Sample data.
Awarded: March 2008

2000 2005

B.Sc. (Applied Statistics) - Institute of Statistical Research and Training

(http://www.isrt.ac.bd), University of Dhaka, Dhaka-1000, Bangladesh.
Achieved First Class (8th Position).

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Muhammad Saiful Islam

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Project: Identification of risk factors of Infant mortality in Bangladesh: A Coxs

linear logistic regression approach.
Awarded: April 2006

EMPLOYMENT EXPERIENCES
2014 May Date

Trial Statistician (Research Officer) (Full time): West Wales

Organisation for Rigorous Trials in health (WWORTH), College of
Medicine, Swansea University, UK.
Main Roles:
Designing and monitoring trials; validating and analysing data; and
contributing to rigorous reports and high-quality papers; leading Research
Design and Conduct Service.
Specific duties:
1. To work closely with NHS and academic colleagues in trial
development groups (TDGs) to design, fund and initiate clinical trials,
randomised whenever feasible, within WWORTHs portfolio, often in
response to national commissioning briefs;
2. To work closely with NHS and academic colleagues in trial
management groups (TMGs) to implement, conduct, manage and
monitor funded clinical trials within WWORTHs portfolio;
3. To work closely with trial and data managers using MACRO4, our new
trial data management system, to assess, improve and validate the
quality of trial databases;
4. To analyse these validated databases statistically, while blinded to
treatment allocation for as long as feasible, notably by inputting missing
data and assessing the fit of the resulting models using appropriate
software;
5. To work closely with NHS and academic colleagues, typically in
TMGs, to interpret, report, present and report trial findings;
6. To develop, maintain and review those WWORTH Standard Operating
Procedures (SOPs) with statistical implications (the majority);
7. To participate actively in all relevant WWORTH meetings;
8. To advise NHS staff and Research and Development Departments in
Health Boards on the appropriate use, application and reporting of
statistical methods to support research in general and trials in particular;
9. To manage own analysis, research and administrative duties to meet
project deadlines;
10.

Report regularly as required to the PI and other stakeholder groups;

11. To assist in project management to ensure successful delivery of

outputs;
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Muhammad Saiful Islam

12.
2014 Sep Date

muhammad.islam@my.westminster.ac.uk
To share the responsibility for co-ordinating activities of the project.

Reviewer at Hywel Dda University Health Board (Honorary position):

I have been appointed as an honorary reviewer for the statistical sections
for all the projects sponsored by the Hywel Dda University Health.

2014 Jan 2014 April Lecturer (Part time visiting): Department of Business Information
Systems, Faculty of Science and Technology, University of Westminster.
Main Roles: Leading the MSc Module: EBSY722 Data Visualisation and
Dashboarding, Teaching (undergraduate and postgraduate level tutorials);
Marking Exam, Delivering professional short courses (e.g., Predictive
Modelling, Making Sense of Data), Supervising MSc Projects, Writing
research scientific articles, and so on.
2013 Oct 2013 Dec Research Assistant: Department of Business Information Systems,
Faculty of Science and Technology, University of Westminster.
Main Roles: Writing research proposals, research on climate change,
writing journal articles (extension of the PhD), supervising students
projects, teaching, and so on.
2012 Oct 2013 Sep

Lecturer (Part time): Department of Business Information Systems,

Faculty of Science and Technology, University of Westminster.
Main Roles: Teaching (undergraduate and postgraduate level); Marking
Exam, Delivering professional short courses (e.g., Predictive Modelling,
Making Sense of Data), Supervising MSc Projects, Writing research
proposals and papers, and so on.

2009 Oct 2012 Sep

Research Staff (Part time): Health and Social Care Modelling Group
(http://www.healthcareanalytics.co.uk/), University of Westminster.
Main Roles: Develop and maintain the Hospital Episode Statistics (HES)
database (1997-2011) in the University server. Take tutorials for an MSc
module.

2011 May 2011 Aug Database Developer (Part time): A short term project in the Centre for
Lifespan and Chronic Illness Research (CLiCIR), University of
Hertfordshire.
Main Roles: Design and create a database of a big dataset collected from a
longitudinal study of child psychology based on their movement.

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Muhammad Saiful Islam

muhammad.islam@my.westminster.ac.uk

2008 Nov 2009 Sep Senior Research Assistant: Health and Demographic Surveillance Unit,
International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research Bangladesh
(ICDDRB).
Main Roles: Managing and analysing data; Writing reports; Assist the PI
(Dr. Peter Kim Streatfield) in research; Arranging and organizing the
weekly meeting.
Studies Involved:

USAID funded project on: Raising the Age at Marriage Among Young
Women
in
Rural
Bangladesh
(http://www.jhsph.edu/gra/Research/Maternal_NeonatalHealth/educati
on.html), and

Maternal Mortality Survey Bangladesh 2010 (BMMS 2010)

(http://www.cpc.unc.edu/measure/our-work/program-areas/familyplanning/maternal-deaths-down-in-bangladesh).

2007 Sep 2008 Sep Graduate Teaching Assistant: Department of Economics, North South
University, Bangladesh (http://www.northsouth.edu).
Main Roles: Assist faculty members in class and research works, provide
tutorial sessions for students, proctor tests, and grading assignments/home
works, coordinate between faculty and students.
2007 Mar 2007 Apr Junior Executive (Mar, 2007 to Apr, 2007): Orascom Telecom
Bangladesh Limited ("banglalink").
Main Roles: Coordinate between the company and customers; Organize
and provide assistants and relevant updates to customers, note and sort
technical problems, and support technical teams.

CURRENT RESEARCH
Currently I am involved in 18 different Clinical Trial Projects under WWORTH, College of
Medicine, Swansea University. Most crucial ones are:
HART: (ISRCTN25616490 DOI 10.1186/ISRCTN25616490)
The title of HART is Hughes Abdominal Repair Trial - Abdominal wall closure techniques to
reduce the incidence of incisional hernias: A multi-centre pragmatic randomised trial. More
information can be found here: http://www.welshbarbers.org/#/hart-trial/4565635550 and
http://www.isrctn.com/ISRCTN25616490?q=HART&filters=&sort=&offset=1&totalResults=31&
page=1&pageSize=10&searchType=basic-search

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Muhammad Saiful Islam

muhammad.islam@my.westminster.ac.uk

DISSSECT (ISRCTN80487202 DOI 10.1186/ISRCTN80487202)

The title is Improving staff stress, job satisfaction and staff turnover rates in care homes for
people
living
with
dementia.
For
more
info:
http://www.isrctn.com/ISRCTN80487202?q=DISSSECT&filters=&sort=&offset=1&totalResults=
1&page=1&pageSize=10&searchType=basic-search
SVSV10:
The title is Long term impact of using stentless aortic valve prostheses a 10 year follow-up of a
randomised controlled trial of stented valves versus stentless valves (SVSV-10 study).
OTHERS:
The rest of the studies are either proposal development state (e.g. Study related to eye astigmatism,
autologous fascial sling) database development state (e.g. Rectus Sheath Catheters, hip fracture,
Transient Ischaemic Attack) or funding applications state (Psoriasis, Omega-3 heart diseases and
so on). Please feel free to discuss any of them in person.
I am also involved in writing research proposal for funding applications with Professor Helen
Snooks for two projects.

PROFESSIONAL TRAINING
Introduction to Good Clinical Practice (GCP): I have attended to the GCP training (NISCHR
CRC) in the University of South Wales at 03/07/2014.
Training for Teaching: I have attended the certified University Research Training programme on
teaching (UT5b) at the University of Westminster (2009/10).

TEACHING EXPERIENCES
Postgraduate (MSc) level:

I was the course Leader for MSc Module: EBSY722 Data Visualisation and Dashboarding,
for the Semester 1 academic year 13/14 at the University of Westminster. This MSc course
was proposed and prepared by me.

MODULE: EBSY706.1 Data Mining at University of Westminster as a tutor in the computer

session (1 Semester).

MODULE: EBSY709.1 Statistics and Operational Research at University of Westminster

(UK) as a course coordinator and tutor (3 Semesters).

MODULE: EBSY798. Research Methods and Professional Practice as a Marker.

MODULE: EBSY799.3 Business Information Systems Project as a Marker.

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Muhammad Saiful Islam

muhammad.islam@my.westminster.ac.uk

MSc Supervisions:
I have experience of supervising 4 MSc projects at the University of Westminster at different
academic semesters.
Undergraduate Levels:

MODULE: EBSY508.1 Business Analytics at University of Westminster

ECO 172: Introduction to Statistics at North South University (Bangladesh) (2007-2008) (3

Semesters).

ECO 173: Applied Statistics at North South University (Bangladesh) (2007-2008) (3

Semesters).

Professional / Short Courses

I have experience of running the following one day professional short courses on behalf of the
University of Westminster:

Predictive Modelling (Ran 4 times as main instructor). I solely developed the material and
delivered
the
course.
(http://www.westminster.ac.uk/courses/professional-andshort/electronics-and-computer-science/predictive-modelling).

Forecasting
Advanced
Level
(Ran
2
times
as
support
tutor)
(http://www.westminster.ac.uk/courses/professional-and-short/electronics-and-computerscience/forecasting-advanced-level).

Making Sense of Data (Ran 1 time as main instructor). I solely developed the material and
delivered
the
course.
(http://www.westminster.ac.uk/courses/professional-andshort/electronics-and-computer-science/making-sense-of-data).

SELECTED PAST PROJECTS

1. Title: Predicting Hospital Standardised Mortality Ratios (HSMR) patients at risk of
readmission. This project was done with Dr. Eren Demir, University of Hertfordshire. Date:
April 2013 September 2013.
2. Strategies to prevent spread of Leptosphaeria maculans (cause of phoma stem canker of
brassicas) into China. This one was done with Dr. Eren Demir, and Professor Bruce Fitt,
School of Life and Medical Sciences, University of Hertfordshire. Date: January 2012
January 2013.

COMPUTING AND PROGRAMMING SKILLS

My main statistical programming skills are in R, Rstudio, SAS base, and SPSS (both GUI and
Syntax). Also familiar in statistical software like SAS enterprise miner, Minitab.

Database (MySQL, MySQL Workbench, WampServer), MACRO4 (basic).

MS Office (Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint).

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Muhammad Saiful Islam

ArcGIS (basic level).

Reference manager: Endnote, Jabref and others.

muhammad.islam@my.westminster.ac.uk

AWARDS AND SCHOLARSHIPS

The University of Westminster Research Studentship 2009 (75,000.00) University of

Westminster, London, UK.

ISRT Scholarships, Institute of Statistical Research and Training (ISRT), University of Dhaka,
Bangladesh.

Undergraduate Government scholarship, University of Dhaka.

PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS

Lifetime Member, Applied Statistics Alumni Association, Institute of Statistical Research and
Training, University of Dhaka.

Student Member, Bangladesh Statistical Association.

IEEE student member, University of Westminster (http://www.ieee.org).

PUBLICATIONS AND CONFERENCES

1. Towards a threshold climate for lower respiratory disease (under preparation).
2. Higher order Distributed Lag Non-linear Model: A case study for climate change (under
preparation).
3. Islam M., Chaussalet T., Demir E., 2013. Modelling the Impact of Climate Change on Health:
A Review, submitted to the journal of Environmental Research, Elsevier (Stage of
resubmission).
4. Zhang, X., White, R. P., Demir, E., Jedryczka, M., Lange, R. M., Islam, M., Li, Z. Q., Huang,
Y. J., Hall, A. M., Zhou, G., Wang, Z., Cai, X., Skelsey, P. and Fitt, B. D. L. (2013),
Leptosphaeria spp., phoma stem canker and potential spread of L. maculans on oilseed rape
crops in China. Plant Pathology. doi: 10.1111/ppa.12146
5. Impact of Climate Change on Emergency Asthma Admission for Greater London, A talk given
at the postgraduate symposium organized by the Centre for Environmental Change and Human
Resilience (CECHR) postgraduate community, 10-12 April 2013 at the University of Dundee,
Scotland.
6. Impact of Climate Change on emergency hospital admissions: a case study for Greater
London, A talk given at the 7th IMA Conference on Quantitative Modelling in the
Management of Health and Social Care, March 25-27, London, UK.
7. Nonparametric Smoothing of the Impact of Climate Change for some selected diseases: a case
study for Greater London, ORAHS 2012 conference, the 38th annual meeting of the EURO
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Muhammad Saiful Islam

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working group on OR Applied to Health Services, the Center for Healthcare Operations
Improvement & Research, of the University of Twente, P-29, July 15, 2012.
8. Exploring the effect of temperature variations on unplanned asthma admissions, Operational
Research Information National Health Policy: proceedings of the 37th ORAHS conference.
School of Mathematics, Cardiff University. P.74-88, July 25, 2011.
9. The impact of temperature disparity on emergency readmissions and patient flows. IEEE
Symposium on Computer-Based Medical Systems - CBMS, pp. 1-6, June, 2011.
10. An approach to exploring the effect of weather variations on chronic disease incidence rate and
potential changes in future health systems, 2010 IEEE 23rd International Symposium on
Computer-Based Medical Systems, October 12, 2010.

RESEARCH INTERESTS
In general, I am interested working in clinical trials, healthcare, disease epidemiology and their
relation to environment, climate change, and pollutions. In terms of topics, my research interest
surrounds mainly on: health, healthcare, impacts of climate change, climate change adaptation,
medical statistics, clinical statistics, hospital episode statistics, air pollutions, disease
epidemiology, cancer research, demography and population studies, environmental statistics, and
so on.
Methodologically, I am interested in the area of oncology, biostatistics, survival Analysis,
longitudinal data analysis, statistical modelling, generalized linear model, and distributed lagnonlinear model or delayed model, generalized additive model, time series, spatial statistics,
spatio-temporal analysis, GIS, predictive modelling, statistical computing with large data, data
visualisation, data mining and databases.

REFERENCES

Ian RUSSELL, PhD

Director WWORTH
Professor of Clinical Trials
Swansea University College of Medicine
Room 204, Institute of Life Science 2, Singleton Park
Swansea SA2 8PP
E-mail: claire.evans@swansea.ac.uk (PA), i.t.russell@swansea.ac.uk
Phones: 01792 606545 (Claire Evans), 07 775 997 824 (M)
Relation: Current Line Manager

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Muhammad Saiful Islam

muhammad.islam@my.westminster.ac.uk

Thierry Chaussalet, PhD

Professor, Department of Business Information Systems,
Faculty of Science and Technology,
University of Westminster
115 New Cavendish Street,
London W1W 6UW
Tel: +44 (0)20 3506 4575
Email: chausst@westminster.ac.uk
Web: www.healthcareinformatics.org.uk
Relation: PhD Supervisor

Naoru KOIZUMI, PhD

Associate Professor, SPP (http://policy.gmu.edu/)
Associate Director, CSIMPP (http://policy-csimpp.gmu.edu/)
School of Public Policy, George Mason University,
3351 N. Fairfax Dr. MS#3B1 Arlington, VA 22201.
Tel: 703-993-8380, Fax: 703-993-8215
Email: nkoizumi@gmu.edu
Web: http://nkoizumi.gmu.edu
Relation: PhD Examiner

Patrick F. LEES
Ex-Head of the Department of Business Information Systems
Faculty of Science and Technology
The University of Westminster
115 New Cavendish Street
London W1W 6UW
Tel: +44 (0)20 7911 5782
Fax: +44 (0)20 7911 5089
Email : leesp@westminster.ac.uk
Relation: Previous Line Manager

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Muhammad Saiful Islam

muhammad.islam@my.westminster.ac.uk

SELECTED MODULES INCLUDE

BSc in Applied Statistics
1st Year

2nd Year

Elements of Statistics

Probability
Sampling
Distributions

Elements of Probability

Estimation and Test Mathematical

of Hypothesis
Economics

Statistical Inference

Demography I

Sample Survey I

Business Statistics

Multivariate Statistical
Analysis

Computer Programming Agricultural Statistics Sample Survey - II

-I
I

Survey
Techniques
and
Design
of
Analysis

Statistical Computing - I

Biostatistics II

Epidemiology

3rd Year

and Applied Regression Advanced Probability

Analysis
and Statistics

Agricultural
Statistics II

Statistical Computing - Differential Equations Social Statistics

II
Linear Algebra

4th Year

Biostatistics I

Demography II
Econometrics

Statistical Computing Operations Research

III

Computer Simulation
and Modeling

Statistical Computing Statistical

IV
Computing V

Actuarial Statistics

Statistical
Computing VI

Research Planning and

Field Training

Statistical
Computing VII

Project Works
Seminars

and

Statistical Computing
VIII
Statistical Computing
IX
Statistical Computing
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Muhammad Saiful Islam

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X

MSc in Applied Statistics

Advance
Inference

Statistical Applied Multivariate Advanced

Techniques
Analysis

Sampling
Techniques Stochastic Modelling
and
Design
of
Experiments

Survival

Environmental
Statistics

Thesis

PhD in Applied Statistics

Statistical Modelling
Generalized
Model

Generalized Additive Distributed

Lag Air Pollution
Model
Non-Linear Model
Health

Linear Poisson
Model

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11

Regression Climate Change and Hospital

Health
Statistics

and

Episode

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