Data Manager, CARDIO4Cities Brunei (Contract role)

Location: Brunei Darussalam  
Host: EVYD Technology

Job Summary: 

The CARDIO4Cities initiative, developed by the Novartis Foundation, is a cardiovascular population health initiative aimed at improving heart health by controlling risk factors such as hypertension and diabetes. The initiative is currently scaling to multiple cities via a network of regional hubs located in different world regions. This initiative is anticipated to be implemented in Brunei Darussalam in partnership with the Novartis Foundation, EYVD Technology, and the Ministry of Health.  

For the implementation in Brunei Darussalam, we are seeking a highly motivated and detail-oriented individual as a Data Manager. The successful candidate will be responsible for identifying, accessing, managing, and analyzing health data from health facilities participating in the program to provide actionable insights for oversight committees.  Key indicators to track are risk factor prevalence as well as diagnosis, treatment, and control rates at different levels of the health system. The Data Manager will play a crucial role in leveraging data to track progress of the initiative. 

Key Responsibilities:

• Work closely with city planners and health systems IT teams to anonymize, collect, and accurately reflect key care data for the CARDIO4Cities Steering Committee based on local priorities and needs of the city population, including the % of people detected, treated, and controlled for the three main cardiovascular risk factors (hypertension, hypercholesterolemia, and diabetes).  

• Manage and maintain one or more large medical datasets to provide insights that inform strategic decisions.  

• Co-design and implement a comprehensive analysis plan for the included data. Make recommendations for future data collection and data governance to make relevant data available to create actionable insights for population health initiatives.  

• Assist in ensuring data integrity and quality within the system through meticulous management practices and data security. Implement and maintain reasonable physical, administrative, and technical safeguards to protect data from inadvertent or unauthorized access, disclosure, use, or modification.  

• Work alongside public health planners and professionals to optimize the impact of analysis results. 

• Integrate a systematic measurement system for progress and outcome monitoring in the health information system and compile relevant data in a simple dashboard for periodic review by the local Steering Committee. Ensure data availability at the facility, district, and city levels. Provide data to inform the redesign of interventions.  

• Effectively and clearly communicate analytical results to healthcare officials at regular meetings. This includes participating in and communicating progress proactively with the Serbia CARDIO4Cities team. 

Required Skills and Qualifications:

• Master’s degree or above in Data Science, Statistics, Epidemiology, or a related field. 

• Proficiency in at least one statistical data analysis software (e.g., R, Stata, Python, or other software for data analysis), with the ideal candidate demonstrating competence in multiple languages. 

• Strong analytical skills with the ability to interpret and communicate complex data sets. 

• Strong experience in the governance, management, and analysis of healthcare data. 

• Good understanding of data privacy and ethical use of health data. 

• Meticulous data management and documentation skills regarding scripting and analysis. 

• Good interpersonal and communication skills, both written and verbal.  

• Experience in interacting with healthcare professionals and public health planners is highly desirable. 
  

• Ability to work independently and as part of a team in a fast-paced environment. 

• Detail-oriented with strong organizational skills. 

• Able to work in Brunei Darussalam without sponsorship. 

Preferred Skills:

• Previous experience in healthcare-related roles. 

• Basic understanding of statistical forecasting or modeling. 

Travel Requirements:

• Occasional travel (up to 20%) may be required within and possibly outside Brunei as needed to conduct training sessions and meetings with healthcare officials.

Why Join Us? 

• Through the CARDIO4Citizens network, our team of population health experts has an ambitious goal of improving the heart health of over 150 million people globally over the next 3 years.

• You will work in a collaborative and innovative work environment, defining new uses for data-driven models to better inform health in large cities.

• Your professional development will be supported through training opportunities.  

• You will work with local, national, regional, and global leaders of health and well-being for social impact.

• You will make a tangible impact to improve cardiovascular (CV) health and reduce overall cardiovascular risk in the population of Brunei Darussalam. Your work will contribute directly to the Cardio4Cities implementation in Brunei Darussalam, with the intention to scale successful interventions to all of Brunei Darussalam, with the National NCD strategy into all levels of healthcare delivery, city planning, and daily community life, leading to higher levels of CV risk factor control and measurable reductions in adverse CV events such as heart attacks, strokes, or end-stage renal disease.

• You will contribute to the ambition for Brunei Darussalam to become a regional leader in promoting heart health for an entire city population by ensuring precise action to prevent and accelerate early detection and prompt management of CV risk and disease.  
  

Additional Context: 

Despite being largely preventable, cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the world’s leading cause of death, causing significant strain on countries’ health systems and economies, especially in cities, where most of the global population lives. Each year, more than 20 million people die from CVD, of which 75% occur in low- and middle-income countries, many prematurely before the age of 60. Meanwhile, high-income countries are experiencing a resurgence of CVD, disproportionately so in underserved populations.  

By 2050, 70% of the world’s population will be urban, and cities will face a growing burden of CVD, compounded by rising inequities linked to social, economic, and environmental determinants of health, along with limited healthcare infrastructure and a shortage of skilled health workers. This calls for reimagining the way we address CV health, adopting a new approach that addresses both the medical and social determinants driving CVD, and cities are the best places to start.  

In response, the Novartis Foundation established the CARDIO4Cities initiative. CARDIO4Cities consists of six interdependent pillars to accelerate and improve access to quality CV health and care, creating more livable, heart-healthy cities. The six pillars of CARDIO are quality of care, early access, policy reform, data and digital, intersectoral collaboration, and local ownership. The approach provides a framework to rapidly reduce overall CV risk in urban populations that is science-backed and offers concrete guidance on how to design and implement city-wide CV health interventions that are tailored to local priorities and needs. 

CARDIO4Cities has already reached over 40 million people, demonstrating the scalability of the approach. Validated in three pioneering cities - São Paulo (Brazil), Dakar (Senegal), and Ulaanbaatar (Mongolia) the CARDIO4Cities initiative has demonstrated strong results, including: 

• Rapid improvement in heart health: In pioneering cities, control rates for blood pressure increased 3-6x within 1 year of implementation¹, translating into an estimated reduction in strokes and heart attacks of 12% respectively 13%.  

• Proven cost-effectiveness: In pioneering cities, the initiative had a 76% lower cost per QALY gained compared to costing benchmark² and is determined to be cost-effective under WHO-CHOICE3. 

• Accelerated detection and management of CV risk: Using a data-driven approach, CARDIO4Cities has proven successful in optimizing diagnosis of CV risk factors within and outside health facilities and improving risk factor management by simplifiying and streamlining guidelines and translating them into clinical decision support tools for health providers (incl. team-based care).