Joyce Niland, Ph.D.

626-256-5673
Joyce Niland
Estelle & Edward Alexander Chair of Diabetes & Cancer Discovery
Research Area
Statistical Methodology in Longitudinal, Observational Studies
Outcomes Research
Clinical Trials Design and Methodology in Oncology
Secondary Use of Clinical Data for Research
Biomedical Informatics and Information Integration
Data Warehousing for Research
Natural Language Processing
Clinical/Phenotypic Data Repositories
Decision Support Systems for Biomedical Research
Appointments
Chair and Professor, Department of Diabetes & Cancer Discovery Science
Research Teams
Diabetes & Cancer Discovery Science
A brilliant researcher, manager and problem solver, Joyce Niland, Ph.D.,chair and professor in the Department of Diabetes & Cancer Discovery Science within the Arthur Riggs Diabetes & Metabolism Research Institute at City of Hope, is an internationally recognized leader in biomedical informatics and computational statistics who is tackling the most pressing issues in diabetes and cancer research.
 
Originally trained as a physical therapist, Dr. Niland applies her attributes of empathy and compassion to the field of information sciences. During her three decades at City of Hope she has helped design, build and run our world-class data analysis capabilities: critical 21st-century tools essential for treating and curing cancer, diabetes and other diseases.

Among her many accomplishments, Dr. Niland founded Biomedical Informatics as a discipline at Beckman Research Institute of City of Hope, where she is the principal investigator of several peer-reviewed research grants. She created the Department of Information Sciences as integrated central research support and served as cancer center associate director for cancer informatics and as chief research information officer.

In addition to being a full professor at our Beckman Research Institute, Dr. Niland holds a joint appointment at the Keck School of Medicine of USC. She is a much sought-after expert with hundreds of publications to her credit. She is a reviewer for the National Institutes of Health, an advisor for several cancer centers, and associate editor of the official journals of the American Medical Informatics Association and International Association for Statistical Computing.
Visit the Joyce Niland Lab
Location
Education & Experience
Degrees

  • 1984, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, Ph.D., Biometry

  • 1979, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, M.S., Biometry

  • 1978, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, M.S., Physical Therapy

  • 1975, Stanford University, Palo Alto, B.A., Human Biology

Professional Experience

  • 2017 - present, Chair, Department of Diabetes & Cancer Discovery Science, Arthur Riggs Diabetes & Metabolism Research Institute at City of Hope, Duarte, CA

  • 2014 - 2018, Chief Research Information Officer, City of Hope, Duarte, CA

  • 2006 - present, Estelle & Edward Alexander Chair in Information Sciences, City of Hope, Duarte, CA

  • 2006 - present, Associate Director for Cancer Informatics, City of Hope's Comprehensive Cancer Center, Duarte, CA

  • 2004, Chair, ASA Graduate Education and Research Task Force

  • 2001 - 2002, Chair, Clinical Trials Working Group, American Medical Informatics Association

  • 2000 - present, Clinical Professor of Preventive Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA

  • 1998 - 2001, Chair, Integrated Advanced Information Management Systems Consortium

  • 1997 - 2017, Chair and Professor, Department of Research Information Sciences, Beckman Research Institute of City of Hope, Duarte, CA

  • 1995, Research Scientist, Division of Biostatistics, City of Hope, Duarte, CA

  • 1991, Principal Investigator, Integrated Advanced Information Management Systems Planning and Operational Grants, City of Hope

  • 1988 - 1995, Associate Research Scientist, Division of Biostatistics, City of Hope, Duarte, CA

  • 1985 - 1988, Co-director, Biostatistics Core, Transfusion Safety Study, USC

  • 1985 - 1988, Assistant Professor, Department of Preventive Medicine, Division of Biometry, USC

  • 1983, Visiting Instructor, University of California Irvine, School of Medicine

  • 1980 - 1984, Instructor, Department of Preventive Medicine, Division of Biometry, USC

  • 1977 - 1984, Research Associate, Department of Preventive Medicine, Division of Biometry, University of Southern California School of Medicine, Los Angeles

Research
Laboratory
Please visit the Joyce Niland Lab page for a complete look at ongoing research. 
Awards & Memberships
Memberships

  • 2014 - Present, International Pancreas and Islet Transplant Association
    2013 - Present, Cancer Informatics for Cancer Center

  • 2003 - Present, International Statistical Institute

  • 1998 - Present, American Medical Informatics Association

  • 1998 - Present, International Association for Statistical Computing

  • 1989 - Present, American Society of Clinical Oncology

  • 1987 - Present, Society for Clinical Trials

  • 1985 - Present, American Public Health Association

  • 1984 - Present,The Biometric Society

  • 1983 - Present , American Statistical Association

Publications

Manuscripts

  • Tumor response ratio better predicts overall survival in neoadjuvant chemotherapy patients with non-metastatic breast cancer. Miller M, Ottesen RA, Niland JC, Kruper L, Chen SL, Vito C. Ann Surg Oncol. 2014 Oct;21(10):3317-23. PMID: 25059788.
  • Marcinkowski E, Ottesen R, Niland J, Vito C. Acceptance of adjuvant chemotherapy recommendations in early stage hormone positive breast cancer. J Surg Res. 2017 Jun 15;214:79-85. DOI: 10.1016/j.jss.2017.02.035. Epub 2017 Feb 28.PMID: 28624063

Abstracts

  • Obtaining phenotypic data in oncology via natural language processing and data mining of text topics. Ottesen R, Vito C, Niland J. In: International Statistics Institute World Statistics Congress; 2015 Jul 26-31; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Invited paper
  • A multivariate economic model for predicting risk-based costs of care for acute leukemia (AL) patients (pts) undergoing allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplant (HCT). Alvarnas JC, Marcucci G, Vanderplas A, Smith E, Murata-Collins J, Levine A, Niland J, Palmer J, Tsai N, Ottesen R, Rabin M, Dzagikian Z, Azimi S, Levine H, Forman SJ. In: The American Society of Hematology; 2016 Dec 3-6; San Diego, CA.
  • Oncological safety of nipple-areola sparing mastectomy in comparison with skin sparing and total mastectomy: Results from a NCI-designated comprehensive cancer center. Bostanci, Z, Wang X, Ottesen, R, Nikowitz, J, Jones, V, Springer, L, Lai, L,Taylor, L , Vito, C, Paz, I, Niland, J,  Kruper, L.  Yim, J. 2017 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, December 5-9, 2017.
  • Mutation Spectrum of Transformed Nodular Lymphocyte Predominant Hodgkin Lymphoma and Comparison with De Novo Diffuse Large B-Cell Lymphoma. Song JY, Egan C, Gong Q, Venkataraman G, Herrera AF, Ottesen R, Niland J, Weisenburger DD, Jaffe E, Chan WC. In: The American Society of Hematology; 2017 Dec 9-12; Atlanta, GA. 
  • Evaluation of Abbyy FineReader Optical Character Recognition Tool Applied to Scanned Outside Medical Records to Facilitate Clinical Research. Hom J, Nikowitz J, Ottesen R, Hughes R, Niland, J. AMIA Joint Summits, Spring 2018.
  • In Search of the Holy Grail: Applying NLP to Identify Recurrent Cancer. Ottesen R, Nikowitz J, Hom J, Kilburn J, Dellinger T, Niland J. Accepted as a Podium Presentation, AMIA Joint Summit, Spring 2019.