Index of Med writing
EMWA conference in Frankfurt
Last week I went to the EMWA conference in Frankfurt, which once again was very successful and a lot of fun. I was teaching two workshops this time, including a brand new one on statistical analysis of binary data. To my surprise, the workshop sold out very soon after conference registration opened. This is unusual for a new workshop (as workshops are not eligible for EMWA professional development credit the first time they are run) and, let's face it, statistical analysis of binary data doesn't exactly sound very sexy.
Continue reading→Medical writing training course
Our next introductory course in medical writing is now open for booking. Places are still available, but numbers are limited so please book early if you want to be sure of a place. Continue reading→DIA clinical forum, day 3
Well, the clinical forum is now pretty much over, and the Dianthus Medical exhibition stand is being dismantled around me even as I type this.
Since my last blog entry, I've been to a couple of interesting sessions in the medical writing track. Yesterday afternoon, I attended a session on the role of medical writers in publications, which is always a lively topic. It was nice to see that, at least among the people attending the session, messages about ethical standards seem to be very well understood.
Continue reading→DIA clinical forum, day 2
We're now on our second day at the DIA clinical forum. I've been to quite a variety of talks: one session on clinical study reports, another on validation of computerised systems, and most recently on statistical analysis of bioequivalence trials, where there was much discussion of whether it's acceptable to widen the acceptance criteria for bioequivalence if drugs have highly variable Cmax. It will be interesting to see what the new guideline on this says when it's published, supposedly later this year.
Continue reading→Live blog from the DIA clinical forum
I'm writing this from the DIA clinical forum in Nice, where Alice, Nancy and I are showing Dianthus Medical to the world of clinical research at the exhibition. We've had a nice leisurely start this morning, as the exhibition didn't start until 10.30, so I had plenty of time for a pre-breakfast run this morning. Running along the seafront in Nice is a particularly lovely thing to do, particularly early in the morning when the sun is not quite above the horizon: the light over the sea is beautiful.
Continue reading→New training date
The date of our next introduction to medical writing course is now confirmed as 26 February 2010. Continue reading→Conflicts of interest
We are no strangers to conflicts of interest in the world of medical writing. The best known case of this is when a pharmaceutical company has paid someone to write an article about one of their own drugs. The conflict of interest here is obvious. Because it is so obvious, however, journal editors are very well aware of the potential for bias in this situation, so such conflicts of interests are, in the main, transparent and well managed. That doesn't mean that some egregiously biased articles don't sometimes slip through the net, of course, but in my experience that doesn't happen often.
Continue reading→Interesting blog on ghostwriting
Kate Johnson, a medical journalist from Canada, has just written an excellent blog on medical ghostwriting. She makes a clear distinction between ghostwriting, which is unethical, and legitimate professional writing assistance, which, she argues, plays an important role in both improving the quality of publications and their timely appearance in the literature.
Continue reading→Job applications
We get a lot of speculative job applications at Dianthus from people who want to be medical writers. I am always amazed how much the quality of those applications varies. Sometimes we get excellent ones, and we have been known to recruit medical writers that way.
Today, however, I received one in which the subject line of the email was "mdical writing position". Needless to say, we won't be offering the sender a job.
Continue reading→How do we find our clients?
People often ask me how Dianthus Medical finds its clients. Truth is, we find clients through various different ways, but I just want to write here about one way in which we definitely don't find our clients.
I've been getting a lot of phone calls recently from people who claim that they are representing senior executives in pharmaceutical companies and have been given the task of finding medical writing, clinical data management, or statistics providers. All I have to do to meet these people who are so eager to use our services is to turn up to a meeting, organised by the person calling me, and pay them a big fat juicy fee.
Continue reading→