What we do

BERD ​(Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Research Design) facilitates research design and biostatistical expertise for credible evidence generation across the spectrum of clinical and translational research. 

The BERD core is comprised of faculty and staff with methodological expertise in health care research and can be provided in either consultative or collaborative frameworks. This aim is already high functioning and provides individual consultative services, seminars, workshops, degree/certificate programs and pilot grants.

Consultation Services

  • Help develop research protocols and enhance methodological planning
  • Offer new training opportunities
  • Provide new methodological innovations
  • Design and analysis of clinical and translational research studies across the T1-T4 spectrum
  • Apply innovative approaches to study design, data collection, and statistical analysis in a variety of areas including adaptive and Bayesian clinical trial design and comparative effectiveness research

For example, we connect investigators with research staff in collaborating centers such as the Preventive Intervention Center to design questionnaires using formats that are most appropriate for the target audience and to design databases for managing questionnaire data.

Building capacity in comparative effectiveness research (CER) is central to our integrated and interdisciplinary activities across the ICTS.

To request analytical support from BERD, please fill out this form.

BERD prioritizes projects based on its involvement in study development (analysis planning, data collection, etc.), as well as funding availability for support.

Services

  • Free one-hour biostatistical analysis consultation
  • Power analysis & sample size computation
  • Research design & study preparations
  • Data management/analysis
  • Reporting

All services are $80/hour for an MS analyst and $120/hour for a PhD analyst.

Services

For a complete view and description of all BERD services, please visit I-CART.

BERD Needs Assessment Survey

Findings from this survey will inform our BERD team about the needs in your department and help us design training programs that can address those needs. If you have not had a chance to take the survey yet, we would appreciate your completing it, which should take you less than 10 minutes.

Complete Survey

Coursework

We offer coursework and degree programs to support clinical and translational research that complements the ICTS' Translational Biomedicine MS and certificate programs.

Collaborations

We work with other CTSA institutions to:

  • Implement software for clinical research management
  • Evaluation and tracking
  • Support the development of novel methods of adjusting for selection bias in CER studies

Staff

Patrick Ten Eyck

Patrick Ten Eyck, MS, PhD

Linder Wendt, MS

Linder has been a member of the BERD team since receiving his MS from the Department of Biostatistics in 2021 here at Iowa. His primary research interests involve programming in the R language, as well as Machine Learning and various modeling techniques.

Highlights

Examples of current work

Dr. Smith (Biostatistics) worked with Dr. Mezhir (Surgery) 

Developed an interactive Bayesian model for prediction of lymph node ratio and survival in pancreatic cancer. New web development tools were created for an interactive web application on individualized patient prediction.

Dr. Cavanaugh (Biostatistics) & Ming Yang, PhD

Developed modeling frameworks for zero-inflated, over disperse count time series data, which was then used to analyze center line-associated bloodstream infections. An open source R software package (ZIM, Zero Inflated Models) was created to implement this modeling methodology.

Drs. Elizabeth Chrischilles (Epidemiology), Juan Pablo Hourcade (Computer Science), and David Eichmann (Library Sciences) 

Developed an online personal health record (Iowa PHR) with user-centered design features through an AHRQ award. Subsequently, the Iowa PHR was adapted as a flexible platform for delivering patient interventions and is now used in two NHLBI multi-center trials let by Dr. Carter (Pharmacy).

In both trials, Iowa PHR supports pharmacist-based interventions to improve chronic disease management but operates in two different data collection environments. In one of the trials, Iowa PHR imports EMR data from the Statistics Coordinating Center and presents the data to clinical pharmacists to use in delivering patient interventions. In the other trial, site coordinators enter EMR data directly into the Iowa PHR.

Dr. Coffee (Biostatistics) 

Dr. Coffee brings expertise in adaptive trial design and is PI of the data coordinating centers for several multi-site networks, including NeuroNEXT.

He is also the PI of a NINDS study on the prevention of migraine headache in children. This study includes a comparative effectiveness component that could have benefited from an adaptive design, but sufficient methods were not available at the time of study planning to justify their use.

This led to a collaboration with Dr. Karialla and Dr. Muller of the University of Florida and a CTSA supplement award for adaptive designs for comparative effectiveness trials. 

Partners

Partners

The Biostatistics Core Alliance

Provide a common point of access to biostatistical support for members of the Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center (HCCC), the Institute for Clinical & Translation Science (ICTS), and other biomedical programs at the University of Iowa.

Biostatistics Core of the Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center

This program provides statistical support for investigators in the design, analysis, and reporting of cancer research projects.

Clinical Trials Statistical and Data Management Center

Situated within the Department of Biostatistics of the University of Iowa's College of Public Health, this center provides expert consultation and infrastructure for multi-center clinical trials.

Health Effectiveness Research Center

HERCe focuses on understanding the reasons for and consequences of variation in treatment or preventative services.

Iowa Summer Institute in Biostatistics

This University of Iowa program, sponsored by the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute, provides biostatistics training and applied research opportunities to undergraduates. The seven week program includes case-based instruction of real biomedical research, computer laboratory training, and clinical and translational research enrichment activities.