Mehrsa Zakershahrak

Mehrsa Zakershahrak

Adelaide Dental School

Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences


Mehrsa holds a Doctor of Dental Surgery (D.D.S) degree (Professional Doctorate) in Dentistry.
As a PhD graduate and researcher at the Australian Research Centre for Population Oral Health, Adelaide Dental School, University of Adelaide, she worked under the supervision of Prof David Brennan and Dr Dandara Haag. Her PhD focused on effect measure modification, effect size, and interaction effects of psychosocial modifiers on socioeconomic gradients in health and quality of life outcomes, using multivariable models and large population-based datasets.
The thesis was accepted unconditionally for the award of the PhD degree - without any amendments by both distinguished international examiners and was recommended for the University doctoral research medal.

Mehrsa conducts research in health-related quality of life, life outcomes, psychosocial aspects of health, income-health inequalities and epidemiological models, using large population-based cohort datasets and advanced quantitative analysis.

She has served as a reviewer for numerous leading international journals, including Nutrients, Plus ONE, International Journal of Dental Hygiene, International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, and Applied Sciences.

Research Interests:

- Population Health
- Health inequalities
- Epidemiological analysis
- Health-related Quality of Life
- Patient-reported outcomes (Health, wellbeing and quality of life outcome measures)
- Psychosocial determinants of health (personality traits and Sense of coherence)

Current project:

  • Population-based studies using the Dental Care and Oral Health Study, with a focus on socioeconomic and psychosocial factors related to patient- reported health outcomes, such as oral health impact, general health and quality of life.

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