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Fred Boehm set out to become a medical doctor, certainly the pathway to a fulfilling career.

However, well into his medical school education, Boehm discovered something else with an even greater potential to impact lives — biomedical research, or in Boehm’s case biostatistical research.

Boehm, who is in his first year as a faculty member at South ��ֱ���� State University, said the message that changed the direction of his life was a sign at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. “Protecting Health, Saving Lives — Millions at a Time” is the school’s vision. That and the work demands of a new physician convinced Boehm to chart a new direction.

At the time, Boehm was in his third year of medical school at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he also earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry in 2001.

Boehm, age 28 at the time, continued with classes and clinicals to receive his M.D., but he also started diving into his new passion. Boehm, originally of Stevens Point, Wisconsin, earned both his medical degree and a master’s in population health sciences from UW-Madison in 2007.

Education: Doctorate, two postdocs

After medical school graduation, he worked in statistics and genetics in Seattle until deciding to return to graduate school at UW-Madison in 2011 to strengthen his foundation in statistics. He earned a doctorate in 2019 and was a postdoctoral trainee at the University of Michigan (2021 to 2024) and the University of Massachusetts Medical School (2019 to 2021). 

Boehm said he sought the SDSU position because of its “supportive research environment with multiple degree programs in the department.” 

The assistant professor in the Jerome J. Lohr College of Engineering’s Department of Mathematics and Statistics teaches upper-level statistics courses. In spring semester, he is teaching a statistics course for nonmath majors. It is designed for “students who are doing experiments and need to do data analysis themselves,” Boehm said. In the fall, his bioinformatics class is geared for students focusing on molecular biology and genomics research.

Working on web app for genetic analysis

In addition to teaching, Boehm is working with a senior student to create a web app that can analyze genetic data. 

A genetic association data base is well-established in the field, but what Boehm and math and statistics major Ji Hoon Park are doing is writing an R language computer code that can validate or negate assumptions made by researchers.

For example, a researcher is looking for gene variances that increase the risk of diabetes or heart attack. Then, based on this mega data, an assumption could be made that diabetes increases the risk for heart attacks. 

“To reach a causal conclusion (for example, diabetes increases the risk for heart attacks), there are some assumptions that go into a statement like that. In academic literature, there are some concerns these assumptions are not assessed quantitatively,” he said. Boehm’s project will allow users to quantitatively determine whether the assumptions are met or failed, he said.

The shinyMR web app will be a generic template for any medical conditions the user wants to run data analysis on, Boehm said.

Users also will be allowed to download the analysis code that is in the R computer language. “Having downloaded code helps to promote computational reproducibility,” Boehm said. 

At this point, Park and Boehm are writing code on their desktop computers. When they are ready to invite the world to participate, Boehm said the university’s high-performance computer system will need to be used. He isn’t speculating on a completion date, but Boehm is pleased with the progress made since October, when the project started.

Patients already benefit from studies

Boehm isn’t claiming that his work has saved millions of lives to date. However, he does believe the field of genetic association studies in which Boehm works has made a big impact on public health.

One example in the field of personalized medicine that has developed since genetic association studies have become more common is in the field of breast cancer treatment. The types of proteins found in a patient affects the type of chemotherapy that is administered, Boehm explained.

While his past academic and professional experience has been in major cities and at large universities (Wisconsin, Michigan, Massachusetts), the transition to Brookings has been easy and refreshing, he said.

For example, Brookings feels a lot like Stevens Point, where his parents still live. “It feels a little more personal. People are almost uniformly friendly. As for my research goals, I’ve been really fortunate to find South ��ֱ���� human genetics researchers that are open to collaboration,” Boehm said.

Speaks common language with collaborators

He added that a benefit of his medical education is that “collaborators see me as someone who understands the language. That along with my public health training has the potential to inform some of the research questions I pursue.”

While he got into biostatistics to do research, he said he also has enjoyed teaching.

“It’s been a real delight to work with eager and enthusiastic students and colleagues. It’s so refreshing to talk with the students and watch them grow over time,” said Boehm who also taught grad students at the University of Wisconsin for six semesters.

Off campus, Boehm can be found walking his dogs, Stitch and Cyril; playing in a Dungeons and Dragons club, and heading to state parks to hike and canoe.