Course details

Summary

Extend your knowledge in your specialist area at postgraduate level with our honours programme.

The Bachelor of Science (Honours) programme involves one year of full-time study, or two years of part-time study, after you have completed the requirements for the Bachelor of Science.

Medical Statistics

Medical Statistics, or Biostatistics, is the study of human health and disease, with applications ranging from biomedical laboratory research, to clinical medicine, to health promotion, to national and global systems of health care. Medical statisticians design and analyse studies to identify the real causes of health issues – as distinct from chance variation.

The Medical Statistics major is designed for those wanting a statistics qualification that is more clearly targeted at careers in the medical area.

Requirements:

75 points: STATS 770, 773, 781, POPLHLTH 708

15 points from STATS 779, 782, or equivalent

30 points from 600 or 700 level courses in Statistics or related subjects, as approved by the Head of Department

Career opportunities

Medical Statisticians typically work in collaboration with Scientists and Physicians. They may work in academic institutions, in hospitals, in the pharmaceutical and biotech industries, or in the government organizations that fund and provide health care.

The key tasks a Medical Statistician is likely to undertake include:

• Meeting with medical researchers to identify and understand their needs
• Selecting an appropriate study design to address the medical questions being researched
• Selecting and applying appropriate statistical techniques for analysing medical data
• Analysing and managing statistical data using a range of software packages
• Interpreting results
• Writing up the results and presenting them to the medical community
• Keeping up-to-date with new developments in medical statistics

The career opportunities that open up reflect the level of research being undertaken. At the higher levels, the career steps are similar to those in academia, in other words a graduate will start off as a Research Fellow, then move to the position of Senior Research Fellow, then to Associate Professor. Opportunities also exist to move into consulting roles.

Further study options

• Master of Information Technology
• Master of Energy
• Master of Science
• Master of Speech Language Therapy Practice
• Doctor of Philosophy
• Doctor of Clinical Psychology

Bachelor of Science (Honours) other subjects:

Applied Mathematics, Bioinformatics, Biological Sciences, Biotechnology, Chemistry, Computer Science, Earth Sciences, Exercise Sciences, Food Science, Geography, Geology, Geophysics, Logic and Computation, Mathematics, Medical Physics and Image Technology, Medicinal Chemistry, Pharmacology, Photonics, Physics, Physiology, Psychology, Statistics.

Entry criteria

The prerequisite is a major in Statistics, at least 90 points at Stage III, and STATS 210 or equivalent.

English language requirements:IELTS 6.5; TOEFL (iBT) 90; TOEFL (paper-based) 575; CAE or CPE 176; PTE 58; MELAB 85.