How Nigerian Statistician Habeeb Abolaji Bashir is Using Data to Improve Healthcare Decisions
By Tolulope Oke
In a world where healthcare decisions are often guided by emotions and urgency, Nigerian researcher, Habeeb Abolaji Bashir is transforming how data can help save lives.
Born and raised in Nigeria, Habeeb Abolaji’s story began at Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto, where he graduated with first-class honors in Statistics. But his journey into health data didn’t start in a laboratory, it began in the field. As a volunteer with the Royal Impact Health Care Society in Kebbi State, he used data to support outreach programs in underserved communities, analyzing disease trends and helping plan health interventions.
“Every dataset represents an opportunity to improve how decisions are made in healthcare,” Habeeb said during an interview with our reporter. “Our responsibility as statisticians is to make sure that evidence leads to better outcomes for people.”
That philosophy has guided his career ever since. From Sokoto to the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) in the United States, where he completed a Master’s degree in Statistics and Data Science, Bashir has remained focused on using numbers to serve humanity. At UTEP, he worked on a groundbreaking machine-learning project that analyzed data from over 200,000 diabetes patients. By designing a predictive algorithm, his team achieved a 75% improvement in treatment decision accuracy and helped reduce clinical errors by 15%.
Today, Habeeb Abolaji is a doctoral researcher and Graduate Research Fellow at the University of Kentucky, USA, where he focuses on biostatistics, predictive modeling, and clinical analytics. His research explores advanced statistical methods such as single-index models and model-based recursive partitioning, which help improve how doctors estimate treatment effects and design personalized care plans for patients.
In one of his published research titled “Flexible Models for the Estimation of Treatment Effect Using Single Index Model and Model-Based Recursive Partitioning,” Habeeb demonstrated a 75% boost in the accuracy of medical treatment-effect estimation and identified key variables that influence personalized healthcare outcomes.
What makes his work stand out is not just the technical brilliance but the purpose behind it. “I see statistics as a bridge between people and policy,” he explained. “When data is well understood, it can change how doctors treat patients and how health ministries plan interventions.”
At the University of Kentucky, Abolaji’s research work supports the next generation of precision medicine, an approach that tailors treatment to individual patients based on data-driven evidence. His efforts have earned him recognition among international professional bodies, including the American Statistical Association, Royal Statistical Society (UK), Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), and Nigerian Institution of Petroleum Engineers and Scientists (NIPES).
Beyond research, Habeeb is passionate about mentorship and collaboration. He frequently holds seminars and masterclasses on advanced statistical tools such as Bayesian Additive Regression Trees and spectral time-series analysis, making complex data science concepts accessible to young statisticians and healthcare professionals in Nigeria and abroad.
His earlier collaborations as a student where he served as a Volunteer at Royal Impact Health Care to work with United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund(UNICEF), Association of Civil Society of Malaria Control and Innumization(ACOMIN), Health Communication Capacity Collaborative (HC3), National Agency for the Control of AIDS(NACA), State Agency for the Control of AIDS(SACA) and World Health Organization(WHO), gave him firsthand insight into the data gaps that hinder effective healthcare planning in Nigeria. Those experiences continue to shape his mission to make health data systems more transparent, reliable, and people-focused.
From analyzing disease trends in rural Nigeria to advancing medical research in the U.S., Bashir’s career reflects a rare blend of intellect, humility, and social purpose. He represents a growing generation of Nigerian scholars who are not just excelling abroad but using their expertise to address real-world problems.
Looking ahead, Habeeb hopes to expand his research by integrating artificial intelligence into medical analytics, building scalable data-driven solutions to tackle global health issues. His ultimate vision is clear: “To make sure every number in healthcare represents a person and that every analysis leads to a better life.”
