Ilias Thomas conducted his research on how the dosage of the pharmaceutical Levodopa can be optimised predominantly from the perspective of the patience using mathematical algorithms.
"Yet my research has as much to do with how to facilitate decision-making for doctors," explains Ilias Thomas.
The title of his thesis was "Optimising Levodopa Dosing Routines for Parkinson's Disease".
Importance of Correct Dosage
Parkinson's Disease is a progressive neurological disease and is considered to be one of the most common neurological disorders. With correct treatment and regular rehabilitation measures, the patient can live a normal life for many years.
"Because the disease varies so much between individuals, it is important to see how the disease develops in the individual and to medicate accordingly," explains Ilias Thomas. "Because I am a statistician and not a physician, the objective of my thesis was to investigate algorithmic methods and how they can be used to find a dosage schedule that treats the symptoms while minimising side-effects," says Ilias, who plans to continue his research towards a doctoral degree.
Ilias Thomas used data from three different sources in his research: from a clinical study at Uppsala University Hospital in 2015, patient data from Uppsala University Hospital in 2011-2015 and data from a clinicial study at Gothenburg University in 2016-2017.
"The information was used to develop methods and to evaluate the performance of the prescribed algorithms," explains Ilias Thomas further.
Ilias Thomas held his defence in front of an audience of 20 people, which included External Reviewer Professor Alexander Medvedev of Uppsala University.