Professor Stephen Walters
BSc, PGCE, MSc, PhD, CStat.
School of Medicine and Population Health
Professor of Medical Statistics and Clinical Trials
+44 114 222 0730
Full contact details
School of Medicine and Population Health
Regent Court (ScHARR)
30 Regent Street
΢ÃÜȦ
S1 4DA
- Profile
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I graduated with a degree in Mathematics and Economics. This was followed by a PGCE and an MSc in Medical Statistics and Information Technology. My PhD involved using computer intensive statistical methods for estimating sample sizes and analysing quality of life outcomes. I joined the University of ΢ÃÜȦ in January 1995. I was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2003; Reader in 2008 and to a Personal Chair in 2009. I was the first Director of the Design, Trials and Statistics (DTS) research group (which included the ΢ÃÜȦ Clinical Trials Research Unit (CTRU) and the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Research Design Service for Yorkshire and the Humber) from 2012-18.
I am a Chartered Statistician with over 30 years¡¯ experience of health services research and technology assessment. The focus of my research has been in the design, conduct, analysis, and reporting of randomised controlled trials of complex interventions; and the design, assessment, analysis and interpretation of patient reported outcomes in clinical trials. I work with clinicians from a variety of backgrounds to develop pragmatic clinical trial designs to capture the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of a variety of health technologies. I have been co-investigator for more than 32 randomised controlled trials.
From 2018 to 2022 I was National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Senior Investigator. I have been a member of the NIHR Health Technology Assessment (HTA) Clinical Evaluation and Trials Board (2011-17); the East Midlands Regional Funding Committee for the NIHR Research for Patient Benefit Programme (2011-2012); NIHR Programme Grants for Applied Research Committee (2020 to 2024). and the NIHR Pre-doctoral Fellowships Selection Committee (2019 to 2024). I have also been a member of the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) Public Health Interventions Advisory Committee (2008-2013).
I have co-authored over 400 publications (including 280 in refereed journals and 5 books, with over 26,000 copies sold). The majority of my peer-reviewed journal articles have been applied research, with the emphasis on the evaluation of new services. I have been a co-applicant, statistical advisor and collaborator on 77 funded Health Service Research projects with a total income value of ?60.3 million.
- Research interests
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- Design, conduct, analysis, and reporting of pragmatic randomised controlled trials of complex interventions.
- Design, assessment, analysis and interpretation of studies with Health Related Quality of Life (HRQoL) outcome measures.
- Health Services Research and Technology Assessment.
- Cluster RCTs and clustering by health professional in individually randomised trials.
- Study design and sample size determination.
- Publications
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- Research group
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PhD Students
- Norah Alghamdi
- Siqi Wu
- Cath O¡¯ Connor
- Raveen Jayasuriya
- Zicong Wang
- Ellen Lee
- Grants
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- PUMA: Person-centred Use of Music in residents living with dementia and Associated changes in behaviour in care homes. Co-applicant. NIHR HTA Programme. (2025-2028). ?1,704,177.
- StratCare Trial 2: Evaluating the clinical and cost-effectiveness of AI-driven stratified care for depression. Co-applicant. NIHR HTA Programme. (2023-2027). ?1,563,070.
- FIRST: Prospective randomised controlled trial comparing three splints for finger flexor tendon repairs. Co-applicant. NIHR HTA Programme. (2022-2025). ?1,151,006.
- MEErKAT: MEsenteric Excision and Kono-s Anastomosis Trial. Co-applicant. NIHR EME Programme. (2021-2027). ?1,942,870.
- SPACES: Supporting Physical and Activity through Co-production in people with Severe Mental Illness. Co-applicant. NIHR PGfAR Programme. (2021-2027). ?2,560,160.
- BASIS: Bracing Adolescent Idiopathic ScoliosIS Study night-time versus full-time bracing in adolescent idiopathic scoliosis. Co-applicant. NIHR HTA Programme. (2021-2031). ?2,777,027.
- STAR-MS: Autologous Stem Cell Transplantation versus Alemtuzumab in Relapsing Remitting MS. Co-applicant. NIHR EME Programme. (2019-2027) ?2,647,973.
- Teaching interests
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I have developed several courses on teaching medical statistics to medical and health science students, clinicians and allied health professionals. I have also co-authored four textbooks: 'Medical Statistics: A Textbook for the Health Sciences 5th edition' 'Medical Statistics: A Textbook for the Health Sciences 4th edition; 'How to Display Data' and 'How to Design, Analyse and Report Cluster Randomised Trials in Medicine and Health Related Research'.
I co-ordinate and teach on SMP491 'An Introduction to Statistics and Critical Appraisal' module on the Master of Public Health programme and contribute to the distance learning version (SMP4147).
- Professional activities and memberships
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- Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society (RSS) and Chartered Statistician (C.Stat)
- Independent statistician member on several data and safety monitoring committees
- Member of the NIHR Programme Grants for Applied Research Committee (2020 - 2024)
- Member of the NIHR Pre-doctoral Fellowships Selection Committee (2019 - 2024)