Dr. David Kent is the founding director of the Predictive Analytics and Comparative Effectiveness (PACE) Center at Tufts Medical Center and a professor of medicine and neurology at Tufts University School of Medicine. Dr. Kent is a clinician-methodologist most interested in the problems of making decisions in individual patients based on evidence from groups. He has a broad background in clinical epidemiology with a focus on advanced methods of predictive analytics and comparative effectiveness. He is most known for his contributions to the understanding of patent foramen ovale (PFO)-associated stroke, which have been incorporated into clinical guidelines worldwide, and for developing frameworks for the analysis of heterogeneous treatment effects and prediction model evaluation.

Dr. Kent has been continually funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) since 2003 and the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute since 2012, receiving 20 awards for approximately $35M from these agencies. He has served on numerous scientific committees and boards, including the Scientific Advisory Board at Optum Labs for seven years, and has been appointed to study data safety monitoring boards and NIH study sections and other funding agency review panels.

A substantial portion of Dr. Kent’s time is spent educating the next generation of clinical and translational scientists. He has directed the MS/PhD Program in Clinical and Translational Science at Tufts University Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences for over a decade and regularly teaches its Study Design, Prediction Modeling, and Real-World Evidence courses. He also has been the PI of multiple institutional research training and career development awards and has mentored over 60 researchers, including junior faculty, fellows, and students, many of whom have gone on to senior research positions.