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Mona Kanaan
Professor, Senior Fellow of HEA

Profile

Biography

Mona is a Professor in Applied Health Research & Statistics and Senior Fellow of HEA. Mona was the Programme Leader for the Postgraduate certificate in Health Research and Statistics and is currently the Director of Post Graduate Education and Chair of the Post Graduate Teaching Committee at the Department.

Mona has worked on statistical modelling of childhood infectious diseases, analysis of randomised controlled trials in the health and social sciences including cluster randomised trials and stepped wedge trials, and spatial statistics. She has published extensively in health and social sciences and statistical journals. She has been involved in the analysis of datasets from both the UK and internationally (Lebanon, Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Syria, and South Africa) with applications ranging from maternity outcomes to MMR vaccines, tobacco control, reablement and criminal justice data. 

She also serves on a number of data monitoring committees and trial/study steering committees and has served on an NIHR regional funding committee and NIHR Health Services & Delivery Research Committee. She is an associate editor of Ethnicity and Health, Deputy Statistics and Methodology Editor of Addiction.

Mona is currently a member of the Royal Statistical Society (RSS) Council and a member of the RSS Medical Section (and has previously acted as its Chair) and led on the Statistics workstream of the NIHR Methodology Incubator. Mona serves on the NIHR Advanced Fellowship Committee.

Mona trained initially as a Mathematician at the American University of Beirut supported by a Hariri Foundation Scholarship. She then moved on to study Mathematical Statistics at the University of Cambridge supported by the Karim Rida Said Foundation. Mona then completed her PhD studies in Spatial Statistics at the Open University supported by an Open University studentship and an Overseas Research Studentship Award. This was followed by a post-doctoral post at the Open University working with Prof. Paddy Farrington on parameter estimation for infectious diseases. Mona then took an Assistant Professor in Biostatistics position at the Faculty of Health Sciences, American University of Beirut before joining the University of York.  

Follow Mona @MonaKanaan3 or at Linkedin

Qualifications

  • BSc in Mathematics (with distinction), American University of Beirut
  • Postgraduate degree in Mathematical Statistics, University of Cambridge
  • PhD (statistics), The Open University

Departmental roles

  • Director of Post Graduate Education 
  • Chair of the Post Graduate Teaching Committee
  • Member of the Research Committee
  • Member of the Research Degrees Committee
  • Member of the Board of Studies
  • Member of the PG Exams board
  • Member of the PG Student Staff Forum
  • Mona previously served:

Research

Overview

Mona's research interests include health statistics in general with particular focus on randomised trials, cluster randomised trials, stepped wedge design, spatial statistics and statistical methods for the analysis of infectious diseases specifically measles, mumps and rubella (MMR). Mona’s work includes trials on control of tobacco use, improving communication skills among doctors and awareness of patient safety for doctors in training, empowerment of pregnant women, and breathing techniques for lung cancer patients.   

Mona's research expertise is in Applied Health Research Statistics. Specifically, she is interested in the analysis of health and social related statistics. To this effect, she usually leads on the statistical aspects in the design of studies in general. She has expertise in various study design including parallel randomised trials, cluster randomised trials, stepped wedge design, spatial statistics and observational studies.

Mona is the founder of the International Conference on the Stepped Wedge Design. Mona was the Programme Chair for the RSS International Conference in Harrogate 2023.

Projects

Current projects

  • CLASS III: Children learning about second-hand smoke : A  cluster randomised controlled trial
  • NIHR Global Health Research Centre - The IMPACT Centre
  • TYPPEX: Tailoring evidence-based psychological therapy for people with a common mental disorder including Psychotic Experiences study
  • Reporting of Intra-Cluster Correlation Coefficients in Stepped-Wedge Cluster Randomised Trials

Completed projects include:

Research group(s)

Supervision

Mona has supervised nine PhD students to successful completion and is currently co-supervising four PhD students at various stages in their research programme. Interested PhD students with proposals that have a substantive/advanced quantitative element in a health-related setting are welcome to contact Mona.

Mona is interested in quantitative research related to tobacco control research, loneliness and social isolation, under-researched and under-represented populations.  For those interested in methodological research within health sciences, Mona particularly welcomes proposals related to stepped wedge (cluster randomised) trials and application of spatial statistics to health-related fields. 

Keywords: Stepped Wedge, Trials, Cluster Randomised, Epidemiology, Surveys, Spatial Statistics, Tobacco Control, Loneliness and Social Isolation

Mona has co-supervised a PhD student who explored the role of social isolation and loneliness in coronary heart disease and stroke participants of the ELSA study. The work of the student attracted national and international coverage. One of the papers that they co-authored also received the best paper of the year from the prestigious Heart journal.

Mona also acts as an external and an internal examiner to PhD theses.

Sucessfully completed PhD Supervision

Current PhD Supervisees

  • Abdullah Sonnet (Co-supervisor with Kamran Siddiqi)
  • Huda Sarwar (Co-supervisor with Claire Carswell and Shaista Rasul)
  • Shushan Li (Co-supervisor with Kamran Siddiqi)
  • Tania Nisa (Co-supervisor with Claire Carswell and Najam Siddiqi)

Thesis Advisory Panel Membership (TAP)

  • (Completed) Member of the TAP group for Kholod AlOtaibi
  • (Completed) Member of the TAP group for Georgios Nikiliadis
  • (Completed) Member of the TAP group for Omara Dogar
  • Member of the TAP group for Cameron Feil
  • Member of the TAP group for Asima Khan

Teaching

Postgraduate

Module leader for:

Ex-Module leader for:

  • Introduction to Regression Analysis which introduced linear regression analysis and logistic regression using the statistical package SPSS.  This was also available for online delivery only Introduction to Regression Analysis Online.
  • Further Regression Analysis covered interactions in regression analysis both linear and logistic and introduces analysis for time-to-event data using the statistical package STATA.  This was also available for online delivery only Further Regression Analysis (online)
  • An Introduction to Applied Multilevel Analysis introduced multilevel analysis using the statistical package STATA

Ex-Co-module leader for:

Publications

Full publications list

External activities

Memberships

Editorial duties

Invited talks and conferences

Recent Activities

  • Keynote speaker: Government Statistical Service Conference 2024 “Beyond Numbers: Championing Interdisciplinary Collaboration with Statistics”
  • Invited talk: Medical statisticians: Always on tap but never on top?
  • Invited talk/Session: "Now and then: The relation between the "medical" statistician and the "clinical" researcher", the Royal Statistical Society Conference 2024.
  • Invited Session: NIHR RSS at the RSS, the Royal Statistical Society Conference 2024.

My first invited talk

  • "An introduction to spectral analysis of spatial point-lattice processes", invited talk presented at the Statistical Computing Section of the Royal Statistical Society

Mona Kanaan

Contact details

Dr Mona Kanaan
Professor, Senior Fellow of HEA

Tel: 01904 32(1375)

@MonaKanaan3