Statistician or data analyst for applied data analyses of large-scale complex data to advance treatment and prevention of mental disorders

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Statistician or data analyst for applied data analyses of large-scale complex data to advance treatment and prevention of mental disorders
  • Psykiatrisk Center København
  • Gentofte Hospitalsvej 19, 2900 Gentofte
We are looking for a highly qualified data analyst starting December 15th, 2025, or soon thereafter.


About us
The Copenhagen Research Center for Biological and Precision Psychiatry is a leading Danish research center within the field of psychiatry with a remarkable research output and an extensive international network. Our main research focus is on prevention and improvement of symptoms and quality of life for people with severe mental disorders. The research center is currently innovating in the psychiatric field with quantitative approaches applying cutting edge statistical, epidemiological, and machine learning methods to medical and biological data. Leveraging the exceptional quality of nationwide Danish registers, large-scale genetic data and population-based electronic health records - we are becoming a key reference worldwide.

Our researchers share a common purpose as they seek to understand the mechanisms involved in mental disorders, seek to identify objective, measurable biological markers associated with mental disorders, and seek to accelerate the understanding of mental disorders towards new prevention and treatment strategies.


About the projects
Our PRECISION PSYCHIATRY projects bring a unique opportunity to leverage the nationwide Danish registers, large-scale genetic data and population-based EHR, containing detailed large-scale longitudinal clinical information, by utilizing multivariate statistics and machine learning including deep learning approaches.

The projects aim to discover novel ground-breaking insights into mental disorders, identify clinical state markers and biomarkers for stratification of mental disorders and disease trajectories, as well as identify modifiable factors with prevention potential. The multivariate understanding of objective markers with clinical relevance is also needed for the clinician to get precise prediction estimates and to identify protective factors for mental disorders.

With the combination of exceptional large-scale data and individual data-driven models, including AI models, targeting the different data types, our aim is to develop prediction models with sufficient accuracy to warrant subsequent clinical testing and implementation. The prediction models should contribute to novel direct data-driven support for diagnostics, prevention, and treatment of mental disorders. If sufficient precision is obtained, the best models can be tested in our Clinical Test Center for Data Driven Treatments, in addition to directly tested and implemented into the EHR system through decision support tools. We have ongoing clinical testing of one of our models integrated directly in the EHR, pursuing implementation of the best models. This will pave the way to actual clinical implementation that would enable the advancement of precision psychiatry to the next level.


About the center and group
We offer an inspiring and informal research environment at a high international level with colleagues from different educational backgrounds, such as medical doctors, statisticians, bioinformaticians, geneticists, project nurses, etc. The Research Director and PI for the project is Professor Michael E. Benros, chief physician, PhD, and director of the Copenhagen Research Centre for Biological and Precision Psychiatry, at the Mental Health Center Copenhagen, Copenhagen University Hospital and at the University of Copenhagen. Among other topics, the group has strong experience and on-going research on large-scale data from the nationwide Danish registers, large-scale genetic data, and population-based clinical electronic health records, in addition to detailed clinical studies with multimodal data as wearables and multi-omics that will be beneficial for the projects in both directions.

We publish research findings in the most prominent scientific medical journals and the candidate should strive towards that each paper will be the best in the world on that given subject.

- we are currently 25 researchers in a young, dynamic and active environment including senior researchers, post-docs, PhD students and research year master students.

- We have a mix of research projects ongoing. Some are clinical case-control studies or randomized clinical trials involving assessments of patients with newly diagnosed depression or psychosis. Other projects are based exclusively on data recorded in the Danish nationwide registers, the electronic health registers such as Sundhedsplatformen, or employ genetic transcription data.

- We work toward advancement of the scientific knowledge base and the understanding of mental disorders. We therefore privilege the publication and dissemination of new knowledge over incremental improvements in predictive performance.

- We privilege the application of robust, well-known methods, in new settings that advance the scientific knowledge of mental disorders over the application of new, untested algorithms.

Moreover, relevant for this position, we have close collaborations with the Pioneer Centre for SMARTbiomed lead by Naomi Wray, Prof. at University of Oxford, and the National Center for Register-based Research, Prof. Preben Bo Mortensen and Prof. Bjarni Jóhann Vilhjálmsson, University of Aarhus, in addition to Prof. Simon Rasmussen, NNF Metabolism Center, University of Copenhagen.

As a working culture, we are ambitious and result oriented, with an applied mindset to develop new knowledge and tools improving clinical psychiatry. We enjoy time together during various social activities, journal club, weekly group meetings with presentations by internal and external speakers, study groups and biannual seminars. You will be part of an internationally leading cross-disciplinary team working towards data-driven improvements of the current treatment of mental disorders.


About the positions
The offered position is a 1-year position.
A 2–4-year postdoc position, PhD position or data scientist position at the Copenhagen Research Centre for Biological and Precision Psychiatry is planned to be advertised in the future. The candidate will combine a strong level of technical knowledge within statistics, epidemiology, data management, and data analysis, as well as scientific interest in clinical implementation. The candidate will run, drive, and manage the research projects from inception, over analysis plans and data analysis, through reporting and publication in a relevant scientific medical journal under the guidance or supervision of senior colleagues. The candidate will focus on applied research with primarily application of existing statistical, machine and deep learning methods to EHR data or nationwide register data combined with genetics. The position requires as much an interest in and a flair for scientific writing, communication and publication toward a medical readership as it requires data analytical skills. The candidate will have to document their skills in scientific writing and communication either through previously published papers or through reports or other documents.

The position fall within a collaborative multi-disciplinary project that involves computer scientists, bioinformaticians, medical doctors and statisticians. It is thus required for the applicants to have a strong interest in working and communicating with clinical researchers and researchers with other backgrounds along the project. Your day-to-day tasks will involve both independent work and active discussions with your colleagues.

About you
Requirements

  • A master’s or Ph.D. degree in Statistics, Bioinformatics, or related field
  • Strong skills and experience in statistics, medical statistics, biostatistics, or epidemiology.
  • Strong skills in statistical programming preferably using R (or Python). This includes writing functions, organization of codebase and workflows, code documentation, and reproducible research.
  • Proven skills and experience in written communication in English.
  • Knowledge of and preferably experience with machine learning, deep learning or other predictive methods – preferable on registers or other large-scale data
  • Interest in learning and researching the fields of psychiatry and mental disorders
  • Strong communication and collaboration skills within a dynamic multi-disciplinary workspace
  • Driven and result oriented with the ability to organize and manage one’s time and projects.
  • A profound interest in our vision of improving the understanding, prevention and treatments of mental disorders


Preferred qualifications

  • Experience with the management of large-scale dataset as the nationwide registers and/or genetics
  • Experience with survival analysis or other analysis methods in medical statistics and epidemiology
  • Experience with causal inference and target trials
  • Experience in scientific writing to a medical readership – as a quantitative expert it requires special attention to communicate in the language of medical professionals
  • Experience with the scientific publication process including writing research papers, submission to scientific journals, and the review process
  • An intelligent, organized, hard-working mindset with a focus on advancing the state-of-the-art knowledge within mental disorders



Place of employment
The place of employment is at the Copenhagen Research Centre for Biological and Precision Psychiatry at the Mental Health Centre Copenhagen, Copenhagen University Hospital, located at Gentofte Hospital. We offer creative and stimulating working conditions in a dynamic, diverse, and international research environment.


Application process
Please submit your application in English or Danish using the link.

The application must include the following attachments:

1. Letter of motivation/Cover letter (1 page in length)

2. Your CV (including education, a list of skills/techniques, previous employments, and other relevant skills)

3. Copy of relevant certificates/diplomas (Transcript of MSc or of doctoral studies as well as corresponding degree certificate)

4. List of publications (if available)

5. Contact details of possible referees from 1-2 people. We will contact your referees if required.

All materials should be submitted in a PDF format.

Salary, pension, and other conditions of employment are set in accordance with the Agreement between the Ministry of Finance and the relevant organizations.

Deadline for applications is: 3rd of December 2025.



Questions / Contact:
For further information about the job description and qualifications, please contact Head of research, Professor Michael Eriksen Benros, michael.eriksen.benros@regionh.dk, Direct Phone: +45-26255239, or

Secretary: Signe Clausen signe.clausen@regionh.dk

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