Dorean Nabukalu

Position before the programme:Data Manager, Iganga/Mayuge HDSS, Uganda
Current Position : Statistician, Rakai Health Sciences Programme, Uganda
Student years at Wits University: 2010 - 2011
Host HDSS centre for the field attachment: Africa Centre for Health and Population Studies, South Africa

Dorean says: “It is a very practical course with relevant, useful and rich course content. The mix of data management, demography, bio-statistics and epidemiology modules in this course gives a broad perspective and wide range of choices of career paths.

During the training period, she developed good skills on how to conduct good research with practical experience at the Agincourt HDSS during the field epidemiology module. She also attained improved data management and analysis skills learnt during the course modules and more so from the exposure obtained at the DSS she was attached to (Africa Centre) for her research report.

““The six months internship at Africa Centre gave me an opportunity to interact with quite a number of scientists while working on my thesis “Mortality in women of reproductive age in rural South Africa” which further added on to my analysis skills I learnt in class. From this piece of work, I submitted an abstract and was sponsored by INDEPTH for a poster presentation at the 11th ISC held in Maputo, Mozambique” she said.

In addition to that, with the help of her supervisors and the then Africa Centre director, Dorean was able to publish her findings with the Global Health Action late last year (2013) (see ttp://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3869952/)

“My research interest is in mortality and women of reproductive age group. I am very grateful to INDEPTH Network for the scholarship, for it was an eye opener” she said..

Currently, as a Statistician, Dorean is charged with (but not limited to) analysis and interpretation of data for generation of statistical reports (to be used in manuscript preparation and other scientific purposes) including regular progress reports for various study protocols, data management for statistical analysis, formulation and preparation of study protocols and standard operating procedures (including study design and Questionnaire design).

She also participates in the Studies Problem solving “Scientific” meetings among others.