Postdoctoral Researcher in Precision Psychiatry

Do you want to contribute to top quality medical research?

Christian Rück’s research group works to improve the life of individuals with psychiatric conditions through understanding their genesis and developing treatments. A core theme of our research is to develop more accurate prediction models for both the risk of, and also consequences of, psychiatric conditions. We work in an interdisciplinary and clinically integrated research environment at Karolinska Institutet in Flemingsberg where you have the possibility and ambition to contribute to quality research at international top-level.

Your mission

We are now looking for a postdoctoral researcher for a two-year employment. You will be working with statistical modelling in two different studies. In both studies you will collaborate with colleagues at Oxford University (UK), University of North Carolina Chapel Hill (US) and collaborators in Sweden.

Study 1 is a registry study led by John Wallert and focused on risk factors for suicide among psychiatric patients that have experienced compulsive mental care. Temporal trends in the risk of suicide and also stratified risks by gender and age will be studied. Forty years of nationwide registry data with over 100,000 recorded compulsory care episodes defines the cohort to be studied. The work involves application of your expertise as epidemiologist/biostatistician to estimate absolute and relative risk of suicide. Your role also involves the production of scientific articles. There is also ample possibility to construct instruments that predict risk based on the risk factors that we will discover, and possibilities to apply more advanced modelling appropriate for large-scale observational data.

In Study 2 you will be working with multimodal data (including genetic data) in a nationwide suicide cohort with the purpose of improving present prediction of suicide aiming to derive and validate better risk models for suicide in the total population. Study 2 also provides the opportunity to apply both well-established statistical modelling and newer machine learning methodology.

Your profile

Qualified to be employed as a postdoctoral researcher is one who has obtained a doctorate or has equivalent scientific competence. It is considered as an advantage if you have completed your doctoral degree within the last three years, if there are special reasons, your degree may have been completed earlier. Applicants who have not completed a doctorate at the end of the application period may also apply, provided that all requirements for a completed degree are met before the (intended) date of employment. This must be substantiated by the applicant's main supervisor, director or equivalent.

You are required to be a trained epidemiologist or biostatistician. The position demands that you are experienced and effective when you work in R, Stata, SAS or similar statistical software. The Applicant is required to have experience with registry-based research and to be fluent in written and spoken English. In addition to aforementioned requirements it is of merit to have prior experience with genetic data and applied machine learning. The preferred candidate is responsible, motivated, autonomous, curious, and hard-working.

What do we offer?

Karolinska Institutet is one of the world's leading medical universities. Our vision is to pursue the development of knowledge about life and to promote better health for all. At Karolinska Institutet, we conduct innovative medical research and provide the largest range of biomedical education in Sweden. Karolinska Institutet is a state university, which entitles employees to several benefits such as extended holiday and a generous occupational pension. Employees also have free access to our modern gym and receive reimbursements for medical care.

As postdoc you are offered work and career development within two well-financed and highly relevant research projects, several well-trained supervisors, and the possibility to work with world-leading registry- and genetic research for the leading cause of death among 18-24 year olds. Suicide does not exclusively afflict the individual yet also produces long-reaching consequences for family, friends, colleagues, organisations, and society at large. Data is available and curated for Study 1 allowing you to be effective from the start, while genotyping for Study 2 is performed as of this writing and for which registry data is already in good order. With us you will also have the opportunity to grow and develop as a researcher in a successful, interdisciplinary research team.

Location: Flemingsberg

Application

An employment application must contain the following documents in English or Swedish:

A complete resumé, including date of the thesis defence, title of the thesis, previous academic positions, academic title, current position, academic distinctions, and committee work A complete list of publications A summary of current work (no more than one page)

Welcome to apply at the latest March 2nd 2022.

The application is to be submitted through the Varbi recruitment system.

Want to make a difference? Join us and contribute to better health for all!