معرفی
Dr. David Ward is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Health Services Research, Faculty of Health, Medicine and Behavioural Sciences, The University of Queensland. He specializes in the intersection of ageing, geriatric medicine, and dementia research, focusing on how modifiable (e.g., education) and non-modifiable (e.g., genetic polymorphisms) factors influence cognitive decline and dementia risk.
- Education: PhD, University of Tasmania (2015), centered on the Tasmanian Healthy Brain Project.
- Research Themes: Frailty-cognition links, genetic resilience (BDNF Val66Met, APOE), sex differences in dementia risk, digital frailty indices, and retinal biomarkers.
His peer-reviewed work includes first-author publications in Neurology, Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatry, and Annals of Neurology. He co-developed the Preventing Dementia MOOC (100,000+ completers) and chairs the DEMON Network's Frailty and Dementia Special Interest Group. Awards include the Erica Bell Foundation for Excellence in Medical Research.
Current funding supports real-time frailty monitoring technology (2025–2029) and digital frailty index implementation in Queensland (2024–2029). As a supervisor, he guides PhD projects on frailty's biopsychosocial determinants and MCI-to-dementia transitions.
