02/15/2024
By Hsien-Yuan Hsu

Date: Feb. 21, 2024
Time: Noon to 1 p.m.
Location: Coburn Hall 275

Speaker: Kun Chen (Department of Statistics at the University of Connecticut)

Title: Color Me Blue: A Journey Towards Data-Driven Suicide Prevention
 
Abstract: With the Zero Suicide initiative, preventing suicidal behavior among patients in the healthcare system has become a national priority. In response, we have assembled an interdisciplinary research team of behavioral scientists, public health experts, clinical doctors, computer scientists, and statisticians. By leveraging large-scale medical and socio-economic data from disparate sources, we aim to identify suicidal risk factors and predict suicidal behaviors to inform clinical decision-making and prevention strategies. This talk will review our journey towards data-driven suicide prevention, focusing on problem-driven statistics and machine learning development. 

Bio: Kun Chen is a Professor in the Department of Statistics at the University of Connecticut (UConn) and a Research Fellow at the Center for Population Health, UConn Health Center. He is a Fellow of the American Statistical Association (ASA) and an Elected Member of the International Statistical Institute (ISI). His research mainly focuses on large-scale multivariate statistical learning, statistical machine learning, and healthcare analytics. He has extensive interdisciplinary research experience in ecology, biology, agriculture, and population health. He has been a core member in establishing and developing the New England Statistical Society (NESS) since 2017. Currently, he serves as the President of the ASA Connecticut Chapter. Dr. Chen received his B.Econ. in Finance and Dual B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Science & Technology of China in 2003 and his Ph.D. in Statistics from the University of Iowa in 2011. Before joining UConn, he was on the faculty of Kansas State University from 2011 to 2013. 

For more information or questions contact: HsienYuan_Hsu@uml.edu.