Postdoctoral Researcher in Clinical Epidemiology and Treatment Research

Do you want to contribute to top quality medical research?

We offer a unique opportunity to conduct clinically embedded research at the intersection of psychology, epidemiology and primary care. You will join a growing and collaborative research environment at Karolinska Institutet and Gustavsberg University Primary Healthcare Centre, combining data from clinical studies with Swedish health and population registers to advance our understanding of treatment outcomes and the long-term consequences of stress-related ill health and persistent fatigue. The position provides excellent opportunities to lead analysis and publication projects, develop your own research questions and contribute to high-quality research with direct relevance to patients and healthcare.

Your mission

As a postdoctoral researcher, you will join Professor Erik Hedman-Lagerlöf's research group at the Division of Psychology, Department of Clinical Neuroscience. Under the direction of Associate Professor Elin Lindsäter, you will work across several ongoing research projects on stress-related ill health and persistent fatigue in primary care.

During the initial part of the appointment, your work will focus primarily on analysing existing data from clinical studies, addressing research questions related to mediation, moderation and prediction of clinical outcomes. Over time, the role will become increasingly connected to a long-term register-based research programme on severe and persistent fatigue in primary care. The programme combines detailed data from a randomised clinical trial with regional and national register data to investigate long-term trajectories in healthcare use, sickness absence, medication use and socioeconomic outcomes.

You will be expected to work independently and take responsibility for the research process, from developing research questions and analysis plans to data management, statistical analysis, interpretation of findings, and preparation of scientific manuscripts. The position also provides opportunities to develop your own research questions within the programme's overall scope and to apply for external research funding.

An important part of the role is to strengthen the statistical and epidemiological expertise of the research environment. You will serve as a methodological resource across the team's projects and contribute to discussions concerning study design, analytical methods and interpretation of findings. The role also involves identifying needs for complementary methodological expertise and initiating relevant scientific collaborations.

Your profile

To be eligible for employment as a postdoctoral researcher, a PhD or a foreign degree deemed to be equivalent to a Swedish PhD is required. This eligibility requirement must be fulfilled at the latest at the time of the employment decision. Completion of your doctoral degree within the last three years is considered an advantage. If there are special reasons, your degree may have been completed earlier.

We are looking for a candidate with a PhD in epidemiology, psychology, public health sciences, medical science, biostatistics or another field we assess as relevant.

You must have:

• Very good knowledge of quantitative research methodology, statistical analysis and data management using R, Stata or equivalent software.
• Experience of independently planning and conducting quantitative analyses in clinical or epidemiological research.
• Documented experience of scientific writing and publication in international peer-reviewed journals.
• Very good spoken and written English.

Experience in one or more of the following areas is considered particularly advantageous:

• Mediation and moderation analysis.
• Predictive modelling and machine learning.
• Epidemiological methods and causal inference.
• Longitudinal data analysis and survival analysis.
• Analysis and management of register data or other large and complex datasets in clinical or epidemiological research.

Furthermore, good proficiency in Swedish, both spoken and written, is considered particularly advantageous. Experience of health economic analyses and contributing to research grant applications is also considered an advantage.

Great emphasis will be placed on personal suitability. You have very good analytical skills and scientific rigour, and are able to take substantial responsibility and independently move research forward. You have a broad interest in quantitative research methodology and enjoy contributing methodological expertise to other researchers' projects. You can recognise when additional specialist expertise is needed and are able to initiate relevant scientific collaborations. You are proactive and motivated to gradually develop your own research questions, apply for external research funding and contribute to the continued development of the research environment.

What do we offer?

A creative and inspiring environment with wide-ranging expertise and interests. Karolinska Institutet is one of the world's leading medical universities. At Karolinska Institutet, we conduct successful medical research and hold the largest range of medical education in Sweden. At KI, you get to meet researchers working with a wide range of specialisms and methods, giving you ample opportunity to exchange knowledge and experience with the various scientific fields within medicine and health. It is the crossover collaborations, which have pushed KI to where it is today, at the forefront of global research. Several of the people you meet in healthcare are educated at KI. A close relationship with the health care providers is important for creating groundbreaking top quality education and research. Karolinska Institutet is also a state university, which entitles you to several benefits through our collective agreement.

Location: The employment is based at the Division of Psychology, Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet, Solna. The work will be carried out primarily at Gustavsberg University Primary Healthcare Centre, Academic Primary Care Centre, Region Stockholm.

Read more about the department here

Read more about the research group here

Application

An employment application must contain the following documents in English or Swedish:

• PhD certificate
• A complete resumé, including date of the thesis defence, title of the thesis, previous academic positions, academic title, current position, academic distinctions, and committee work
• A complete list of publications
• A summary of current work (no more than one page)

KI applies individual and differentiated salary setting in accordance with our collective agreements RALS and RALS-T

The application is to be submitted through the Varbi recruitment system.

Want to make a difference? Join us and contribute to better health for all!

Anställningsform: tidsbegränsad anställning | Anställningens omfattning: heltid | Antal lediga befattningar: 1 | Sysselsättningsgrad: 100% | Ort: Värmdö | Län: Stockholms län | Land: Sweden | Referensnummer: STÖD 2-3598/2026 | Kontakt: Elin Lindsäter , Elin Lindsäter , Lisa Rister Walker 0852483287, Lisa Rister Walker 0852483287, | Facklig företrädare: Yongtao Xue-Franzén, OFR/ST , Yongtao Xue-Franzén, OFR/ST , Per Hydbring, SACO , Per Hydbring, SACO , Robert Lindberg, SEKO , Robert Lindberg, SEKO , | Publicerat: 2026-09-10 | Sista ansökningsdag: 2026-10-01