Alex Ocampo

• Doctor of Philosophy
• Statistician at Novartis

Background Neurostatus-Expanded Disability Status Scale (EDSS) is the standard measure used to assess impairment and disability in multiple sclerosis (MS) trials but requires trained expert neurologists. Objectives This study aims to evaluate the concordance of Neurostatus-EDSS assessments from specially trained health care professionals (HCPs) an...

Background The long-term disease trajectory of people living with multiple sclerosis (MS) can be improved by initiating efficacious treatment early. More quantitative evidence is needed on factors that affect a patient’s risk of disability worsening or possibility of improvement to inform timely treatment decisions. Methods We developed a multista...

Existing methods for fitting continuous time Markov models (CTMM) in the presence of covariates suffer from scalability issues due to high computational cost of matrix exponentials calculated for each observation. In this article, we propose an optimization technique for CTMM which uses a stochastic gradient descent algorithm combined with differen...

Confusion often arises when attempting to articulate target estimand(s) of a clinical trial in plain language. We aim to rectify this confusion by using a type of causal graph called the Single-World Intervention Graph (SWIG) to provide a visual representation of the estimand that can be effectively communicated to interdisciplinary stakeholders. T...

Existing methods for fitting continuous time Markov models (CTMM) in the presence of covariates suffer from scalability issues due to high computational cost of matrix exponentials calculated for each observation. In this paper we propose an optimization technique for CTMM which uses a stochastic gradient descent algorithm combined with differentia...

Confusion often arises when attempting to articulate target estimand(s) of a clinical trial in plain language. We aim to rectify this confusion by using a type of causal graph called the Single-World Intervention Graph (SWIG) to provide a visual representation of the estimand that can be effectively communicated to interdisciplinary stakeholders. T...

The global movement to use routine information for managing health systems to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, relies on administrative data which have inherent biases when used to estimate coverage with health services. Health policies and interventions planned with incorrect information can have detrimental impacts on communities. Stati...

Patients with multiple sclerosis acquire disability either through: (1) Relapse-associated worsening (RAW), or (2) progression independent of relapse activity (PIRA). This study addresses the relative contribution of relapses to disability worsening over the course of the disease, how early progression begins, and the extent to which multiple scler...

Patients often discontinue from a clinical trial because their health condition is not improving or they cannot tolerate the assigned treatment. Consequently, the observed clinical outcomes in the trial are likely better on average than if every patient had completed the trial. If these differences between trial completers and non‐completers cannot...

In the U.S. and Canada, Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) use has become increasingly common; Chinese immigrants have particularly high rates of TCM use. In this study, we used a cross sectional survey study design to assess the specific types of Traditional Chinese Herbal Medicine (TCHM) used, the concurrent use of TCHM and conventional cancer tr...

Taxi and for-hire vehicle (FHV) drivers are a predominantly immigrant population facing a range of occupational stressors, including lack of workplace benefits and increasing financial strain from tumultuous industry changes and now COVID-19’s devastating impact. Bilingual research staff surveyed 422 New York City taxi/FHV drivers using a stratifie...

To examine nutrition benefit under-enrollment in Latinx American immigrant families, we administered a survey to 100 adults attending a NY Latinx American community serving organization. We used a logistic regression approach to analyze misinformation impact on enrollment, and examined non-enrollment explanations, among participants in whose famili...

Patients often discontinue treatment in a clinical trial because their health condition is not improving. Consequently, the patients still in the study at the end of the trial have better health outcomes on average than the initial patient population would have had if every patient had completed the trial. If we only analyze the patients who comple...

Background: Language barriers can influence the quality of health care and health outcomes of limited English proficient patients with cancer. The use of medical interpretation services can be a valuable asset for improving communications in emergency care settings. Objective: To evaluate whether a mobile translation application increased call freq...

Immigrant taxi drivers in metropolitan cities are exposed to experiences of discrimination and occupation-based health risks. Given the structural differences in health care systems in the United States and Canada, we investigated the differences in reports of discrimination, health conditions and concern about health conditions between taxi driver...

Discrimination is associated with poorer mental and physical health outcomes. Taxi drivers have a higher risk of exposure to discrimination and higher rates of chronic conditions. A cross-sectional needs assessment was conducted with a multilingual group of 535 male taxi drivers in New York City. Drivers reporting higher discrimination were more li...

Investigators have proposed a “transdiagnostic vulnerability framework” that examines the relationship between smoking and broader emotional factors, including anhedonia, anxiety sensitivity, and distress tolerance. Because smoking and depression are more common in persons living with HIV and AIDS (PLWHA) than in the general population, understandi...