Cancer Epidemiology

Our Cancer Epidemiology Division is a world-leading research unit working to produce high-quality, timely evidence identifying the causes of cancer, predictors of cancer risk, and factors affecting survival following a cancer diagnosis, to improve prevention, screening and survival.

Improving our efforts at cancer control is the focus of our multidisciplinary team of epidemiologists and support staff.

Mission and priorities

Cancer is a devastating disease and leading cause of death and ill health.

The Cancer Epidemiology Division shares the overarching mission and values articulated in Cancer Council Victoria’s strategic plan. Within this strategic framework, the organisation’s research goal is to discover and improve prevention, detection, treatment, and care opportunities through ground-breaking cancer research. Research-related priorities relevant to CED include to:

  • Create rigorous, timely evidence to inform the most effective practices, laws, policies, programs, and campaigns.
  • Enhance and promote our data platforms to ensure they are of maximum value to the research and public health sectors.
  • Maintain our scientific leadership in research

Our research themes

  1. lifestyle cancer epidemiology
  2. genomic cancer epidemiology 
  3. prostate cancer epidemiology
  4. epidemiology of the forgotten cancers
  5. inequalities in cancer outcomes

Our cohort studies

Melbourne Collaborative Cohort Study (Health 2020)

Australian Breakthrough Cancer Study (ABC Study)

Our researchers

Roger Milne

Prof. Roger Milne

Head of Division
BCom, BSW, BA, Grad Dip Clin Epi, MSc, PhD

Roger is a cancer epidemiologist with expertise in the analysis of genetic and lifestyle data from observational studies, and in international collaboration.

Read more
A Prof Brigid Lynch

A/Prof. Brigid Lynch

Deputy Head of Division
BSc, MScs Comm, PhD

Brigid is a cancer epidemiologist whose research focuses on how physical activity is related to cancer risk, biological mechanisms underlying risk, and health outcomes for cancer survivors.

Read more
A/Prof Robert MacInnis

A/Prof. Robert MacInnis

Principal Research Fellow
BSc (Hons), Grad Dip Epi Biostat, PhD

Robert is an epidemiologist with over 20 years’ experience in the design and analysis of studies examining the role of genetic and environmental causes of chronic diseases, particularly cancer.

Read more
A/Prof. Harindra Jayasekara

A/Prof. Harindra Jayasekara

Principal Research Fellow
MBBS, MSc, MD, PhD

Harindra is a public health physician and cancer epidemiologist with expertise in the analysis of large observational study datasets. Harindra’s research focuses on cancer risk related to lifestyle factors, aetiology and early detection of gastro-oesophageal cancer and precancerous lesions, post-cancer outcomes including metachronous cancer, and cancer prevention policy..

Read more
Dr Julie Bassett

Dr Julie Bassett

Senior Research Fellow
BSc, MSc, PhD

Julie is a biostatistician/epidemiologist. Her work focuses mainly on investigating the influence of diet and other modifiable lifestyle factors on cancer risk using data from Melbourne Collaborative Cohort Study and family-based case control studies.

Read more
Dr Nina Afshar

Dr Nina Afshar

Graham Giles Research Fellow
BA, BSc, MSc, PhD

Nina is a cancer epidemiologist with expertise in inequalities in cancer survival. She is currently working on an international project on identifying modifiable risk factors for bladder cancer, in collaboration with Harvard University and the National Cancer Institute (NCI) Cohort Consortium.

Read more
Dr Yang Peng

Dr Yang Peng

Research Fellow
MBBS, MMed, PhD

Yang is a medically qualified early career researcher and epidemiologist with expertise in the analysis of large linked national and international survey and hospitalisation datasets. Yang is currently working on a large international pooling cohort on dietary factors and onset of gastro-oesophageal cancer.

Read more
Dr Howard Tang

Dr Howard Tang

Research Fellow
MBBS, BMedSci (Hons), PhD

Howard is a researcher with broad experience across multiple domains of clinical and biomedical research, including using machine learning and cluster analysis to interrogate datasets.

Read more

Dr Simon Cheah

Research Fellow
MBBS, MPH, PhD

Simon is and early career researcher in cancer epidemiology. His research interests are in behavioural epidemiology and cancer aetiology, particularly the investigation of potentially modifiable factors with application to cancer prevention and survival.

Read more

Dr Craig Pickett

Senior Research Officer
MExSci MEpi Ph.D

Craig currently holds a Master of Epidemiology, from the University of Melbourne. His work focuses on exploring population-level relevance of risk factors and how family history modifies risk of cancer due to lifestyle factors.

Read more

Our honorary research fellows

Prof. Graham Giles, AM

Distinguished Research Fellow (Honorary)
BSc, MSc, PhD

Graham is a cancer epidemiologist with 40 years of research experience. He joined Cancer Council Victoria in 1983 and stepped down as Head of the Cancer Epidemiology Division in 2017.

Read more

Prof. Dallas English

Senior Principal Research Fellow (Honorary)
BSc, MSc, PhD

Dallas is a cancer epidemiologist with over 35 years’ experience. His research interests include the epidemiology of breast, colorectal and prostate cancer and of gastro-oesophageal reflux disease.

Read more

A/Prof. Allison Hodge

Principal Research Fellow (Honorary)
BAgSc (Hons), BSc, Grad Dip Diet, MEnvSc, Grad Dip Epi Biostats, PhD

Allison is an epidemiologist with over 20 years’ experience in nutritional epidemiology. She collaborates with researchers in Australia and overseas who have used dietary data from CED studies or collected dietary data using CED-developed dietary questionnaires.

Read more

Dr Rebecca Bergin

Research Fellow (Honorary)
PhD

Rebecca is a health services researcher. Her research interests include inequities in cancer care, particularly rural-urban inequities, access and timeliness of cancer care, optimal care pathways, and understanding cancer policymaking.

Read more

Want to collaborate?

Our researchers collaborate extensively with other researchers in Australia and overseas. Contact us here or contact our researchers directly.