Atalay Demiray, MD, MSc
Atalay Demiray is a physician and decision scientist. He is a PhD candidate in Health Policy and Management (Economics Track) at Yale University, where he is advised by A. David Paltiel. His research turns clinical and epidemiologic evidence into health policy. He builds microsimulation and decision-analytic models of tobacco regulation and maternal and infant health, studies how regulators should handle artificial intelligence in medicine, and compares how health systems perform across countries.
He trained as a physician first, and that lens still shapes the questions he asks. His work has appeared in journals including Hypertension, Health Affairs Scholar, and the European Journal of Internal Medicine. He earned his MD at Koç University in Istanbul alongside a second major in International Relations, then completed an MSc in health economics at Erasmus University Rotterdam, where his thesis on the regulation of AI in medicine was named Thesis of the Year in Health Economics, Policy and Law. He is the first in his family to graduate from college and medical school, a fact that still shapes what he works on and who he works for.
These days people ask a chatbot before they ask a person, so he trained one on himself. Have a question about him or his work, and would rather not click through the whole site? Ask GenATA, his AI guide, and let it do the talking.
News
- Jun 2026 Presented a poster at the SMDM 48th Annual Meeting in Oslo: projecting the maternal and infant health impact of a federal nicotine product standard.
- Jun 2026 New working paper on SSRN: maternal morbidity, infant mortality, and health-care costs attributable to prenatal smoking in the e-cigarette era. Under review.
- Apr 2026 New paper on pathologic placental separation and long-term maternal mortality, published in PLOS ONE.
- Sep 2025 First-author preprint on medRxiv: maternal and infant health benefits of a nicotine product standard in the United States.
- Sep 2025 Joined the Yale StatLab as a statistical consultant, advising researchers across the university on study design, modeling, and analysis.
Show earlier milestones (9)
- Oct 2024 Presented a poster at the SMDM 46th Annual North American Meeting in Boston, on the cost-effectiveness of metformin versus SGLT2 inhibitors as first-line therapy in type 2 diabetes.
- 2023 Began the PhD in Health Policy and Management (Economics Track) at Yale University.
- 2023 Awarded a Fulbright PhD Scholarship.
- 2023 MSc thesis on the regulation of AI in medicine named Thesis of the Year in Health Economics, Policy and Law at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
- 2022 Graduated from Koç University with an MD (ranked third in the class) and a BA in International Relations (ranked first in the class).
- 2022 Awarded the Jean Monnet and Holland Scholarships to study health economics at Erasmus University Rotterdam.
- 2021 First peer-reviewed journal articles published, in nephrology and internal medicine, including work in Hypertension.
- 2019 First conference presentation, a poster at the 29th European Congress of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (ECCMID) in Amsterdam.
- 2015 Graduated from Istanbul Atatürk Science High School with an Outstanding Achievement certificate.
Featured Work
Maternal & Infant Health Benefits of a Nicotine Product Standard in the United States
Introduces the SEP microsimulation model linking smoking and e-cigarette behavior to maternal and infant outcomes.
Long-Term Maternal Mortality Associated with Pathologic Placental Separation
A comparison highlighting possible trends and mechanisms linking pathologic placental separation to long-term maternal mortality.
Beyond "Business as Usual": Lessons from FIFA for Fair Benefit-Sharing in Global Health
Co-authored analysis applying benefit-sharing frameworks to global health governance.