It is a tremendous irony that my present profession is closer to how I pictured an academic career than academia itself turned out to be.
Continue readingAll I ever wanted
MedComms
Devil’s advocate (the case against preprints in biomedical science)
I’m a preprint fan. All the research papers from my final period in academia were posted as preprints before being submitted to journals, and I’ve also utilised preprint peer review services at Research Commons and eLife.
But in my present work as a medial writer, where I’m involved in the publication and dissemination of industry-funded biomedical research, I am slowly realising that many of the things that make preprints so fantastic in the biological sciences simply don’t apply in biomedical science, or not to the same extent.
Continue readingMedComms is not SciComm
When scientists assess career options outside academia, there’s a prevailing misconception that MedComms is a variant of SciComm.
The trap, after all, is right there in the name. SciComm = science communication, MedComms = medical communications, so MedComms must basically be the same activity but dealing with medicine instead of scientific research, right?
Wrong. Here’s why.
Continue reading2025: Total Internal Reflection’s year in review
The magic of MedComms: an EMBL Careers Webinar
Medical Communications (MedComms) might just be the best industry career option out there for scientists who most enjoy the writing/communicating/organising parts of the job, and on 22nd November 2024 the EMBL Fellows’ Careers Service hosted a webinar about it. The panel members were:
- Lucija Fleisinger, Medical Writer, Oxford PharmaGenesis, UK
- Laura McMahon, Senior Scientific Director and Team Lead, Envision Pharma Group, Scotland
- Brooke Morriswood, Manager, Scientific Services, Ashfield MedComms GmbH, Germany
2024: Total Internal Reflection’s year in review
Pathfinding (some tips on finding science jobs outside academia)
There seems to be no shortage of outlets and people offering advice on how to find jobs outside academia right now, but for what it’s worth, this was the way I went about it.
Continue readingFrom the top down
You wouldn’t think that mandatory training on company fine print could come across as a beacon of enlightenment, but that’s how it did for me.
Continue readingOnly in the abstract
I do miss academia, but only in the abstract.
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