Dr Christian Bannister - Chief Executive Officer
Christian is an experienced data scientist and project manager with a proven track record of delivering data products on time and within budget. He has a PhD from the School of Computer Science and the School of Medicine at Cardiff University, and is an experienced biostatistician and statistical programmer, specialising in analysis of large real-world observational datasets, including CPRD and THIN. Christian's principal research interests lie in the field of predictive modelling, machine learning and big data analytics.
He has a broad experience as a biostatistician including epidemiology, health economics and outcomes research - working in diverse therapeutic areas, such as cardiology, endocrinology, hepatology, immunology, and neurology. Christian has over 13 years programming and analytical experience, including frequentist statistics, machine learning and high performance computing. He has successfully delivered complex multidisciplinary projects and effectively managed teams of between 1 and 27 staff on permanent and project basis.
Christian has previously been an associate staff member in the MRC Centre for Neuropsychiatric Genetics and Genomics, Cardiff University School of Medicine, a member of the Genetic and Environmental Risk in Alzheimer's Disease (GERAD), International Genomics of Alzheimer's Project (IGAP) and Dementia Platform UK (DPUK) collaborations.
James Frost - Chief Technical Officer
James graduated with a degree in Computer Science and Modern Languages and has spent the last 15 years delivering software projects of all sizes. His particular expertise is in web technologies, cloud infrastructure and delivering systems with a focus on a high quality user experience.
James has a track record of delivering high quality & intuitive data analysis tools to the healthcare industry over the past 6 years, including extensive work with large real-world healthcare datasets including CPRD, THIN and the SAIL databank.
Mark Smithson - Chief Operations Officer
Mark qualified as an Architect and spent the early part of his career designing and managing school building projects. His transferrable skills in determining project requirements, designing creative solutions and managing complex projects have been extremely valuable in the software projects he has undertaken in the last 13 years.
Mark applies a lean approach to project management, structuring projects to maximise return on investment and reduce risk. He has delivered many cost effective, flexible software solutions that exceed business objectives and has specific experience in creating distributed software systems and managing cloud infrastructure.
Dr Chris Poole - Consultant
Chris originally trained as a clinical pharmacist before graduating from Cardiff University with a PhD in Pharmacoepidemiology and transferring these skills to a research career. He has extensive experience as an analyst of UK anonymised patient-level data from sources such as CPRD and THIN, and has co-authored over one hundred peer-reviewed publications across many clinical disciplines including diabetes, cardiovascular medicine, rheumatology, dermatology and pain medicine. Additionally, having led numerous reimbursement submissions, Chris has developed extensive knowledge of health technology assessment in particular the evidence synthesis requirements.
Chris has previously held academic research positions at Cardiff University, most recently in the Cochrane Institute of Primary Care and Public Health, School of Medicine at Cardiff University, a member of the MRC-funded CIPHeR collaboration. In 2014/15, Chris worked in the European headquarters of a Top 20 global pharmaceutical company where his work to establish a real-world data analytics infrastructure was recognised with a company digital innovation award.
About Digital Health Labs
Digital Health Labs is an innovative research consultancy specialising in real-world data analytics, health economics & outcomes research.
We have particular expertise in using advanced analytics and cutting-edge technologies to help our clients gain clarity on the value of their pharmaceutical products and services.
We have an in-depth knowledge of the UK real-world evidence landscape and a proven track record of supporting our clients with health technology assessment submissions to European agencies including NICE, SMC, and AWMSG.
Our agile multidisciplinary approach combines a diverse range of people, data and technologies to deliver research in a robust, reproducible and interactive manner that adds real value for our clients.