Dr. David DeMets is the Max Halperin Professor of Biostatistics, Emeritus, and former Chair of the Department of Biostatistics and Medical Informatics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He has authored numerous statistical methods papers, collaborative scientific and clinical papers, and book chapters, and has co-authored four books, Fundamentals of Clinical Trials, Data Monitoring in Clinical Trials: A Case Studies Approach, Data Monitoring Committees in Clinical Trials: A Practical Perspective, and Statistical Methods for Clinical Trials.
Dr. DeMets has served on numerous NIH and industry-sponsored Data Safety and Monitoring Committees for clinical trials in diverse disciplines. He served on the Board of Directors of the Society for Clinical Trials (1983-1987) and American Statistical Association (1987-89), as well as having been President of the Society for Clinical Trials (1989) and President of the Eastern North American Region (ENAR) of the Biometric Society (1993). Dr. DeMets was Elected Fellow of the International Statistics Institute in 1984, the American Statistical Association in 1986, the Association for the Advancement of Science in 1998, the Society for Clinical Trials in 2006, and the American Medical Informatics Association in 2008.
In 2013, he was elected as a member of the Institute of Medicine, now the National Academy of Medicine. Dr. DeMets’ research interests include the design, data monitoring, and analysis of clinical trials, especially large Phase III randomized clinical trials. He is well known for his work on sequential statistical methods for monitoring interim data for early evidence of intervention benefit or possible harm. See Dr. DeMets’ Faculty page at the University of Wisconsin.