Liz joined Duke’s Global Health Institute and the Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics in March 2012 to collaborate with, and provide biostatistical support to DGHI faculty and affiliates. With a PhD in statistics from McGill University, Canada, followed by four years working as a collaborative biostatistician in the Department of Medical Statistics, Faculty of Epidemiology and Population Health of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), Liz has extensive experience working in both epidemiological studies and randomized trials across a range of substantive areas in developed world and resource poor settings. Thanks to her participation in multi-disciplinary projects, she has a great appreciation for the importance of good study design and data collection and is well aware that no fancy statistical analyses can save researchers from the scourge of bad data. Through those experiences and her teaching in different settings, including the UK, Canada, France and Tanzania, she is aware that statisticians and their collaborators sometimes“speak a different language”. As a result, her approach is very much one of translation, pragmatism and collaboration. Her current substantive interests include malaria, disability and disease burden with an emphasis on eye diseases, cardiovascular disease and mental health, together with child health and education. Examples of recent research collaborations include:

The International Centre for Eye Health, LSHTM
Estimation of cataract incidence in order to plan for the surgical volume required to prevent blindness in line with the VISION 2020 goals. Data from three largenational prevalence surveys of blindness in Bangladesh, Nigeria and Pakistan were used to estimate incidence and predict future disease burden.

Ifakara Health Institute, Tanzania
Research projects in public health entomology in Tanzania including experimental field trials to evaluate registered spatial repellents as potential replacements for DDT against malaria.

Kenyan Medical Research Institute, Nairobi, & Harvard Graduate School of Education
Statistician to the Health and Literacy Intervention Trial, a factorial cluster randomized trial to evaluate the impact of malaria control and enhanced literacy instruction on health and educational achievement of school children in Kenya. More than 5000 children from 101 schools on the south-east coast were enrolled.

National Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College, London, UK
Research in preventive cardiology including a national survey to evaluate lifestyle and risk factor management in coronary patients and people at high risk of developing cardiovascular disease, secondary analyses of a European cluster randomized trial of a lifestyle intervention to improve cardiovascular (CV) health and a case-control study of the effects of exposure to violence on CV disease.

European Huntington’s Disease Network
Use of longitudinal registry data from more than 2000 people with a range of measures such as motor function, cognition and depression, to develop recommendations for how best to design a forthcoming trial.

Office Location:	Trent 239
Office Phone:	(919)660-0481
Email Address:

School(s):: School of Medicine

Department(s):: Biostatistics & Bioinformatics

Geographical Interests:: United Kingdom; Ethiopia; Kenya; Tanzania

Recent Publications (More Publications)

Mng’ong’o FC, Sambali JJ , Sabas E, Rubanga J, Magoma J, John A, Turner EL, Nyogea D, Ensink J, Moore SJ, Repellant plants provide affordable natural screening to prevent mosquito house entry in tropical rural settings - Results from a pilot efficacy study, PLoS ONE, vol. 6(10): e25927 (2012)
Halliday KE, Karanja P, Turner EL, Okello G, Njagi K, Dubeck MM, Jukes MCH, Brooker S, Plasmodium falciparum, anaemia and cognitive and educational performance among school children in an area of moderate malaria transmission: baseline results of a cluster randomized trial on the coast of Kenya, Tropical Medicine and International Health. . (2012)
Kotseva K, Jennings CS, Turner EL, Mead A, Connolly S, Jones J, Bowker T, Wood DA, ASPIRE-2-PREVENT: A survey of lifestyle, risk factor management and cardioprotective medication in coronary patients and people at high risk of developing cardiovascular disease in the UK, Heart (2012)
Shah SP, Gilbert CE, Rezzavi H, Turner EL, Lindfield RJ, Variation in pre-operative visual acuity among cataract patients reflects levels of social deprivation at the population level: a global study, Bulletin of the WHO, vol. 89 (2011), pp. 749-756
Connolly S, Holden A, Turner EL, Fiumicelli G, Stevenson J, Hunjan M, Mead A, Kotseva K, Jennings C, Jones J, Wood D A, MyAction – an innovative approach to the prevention of cardiovascular disease in the community, British Journal of Cardiology, vol. 18(4) (2011), pp. 171-176