20 March 2008

Drug Safety and Pharmacovigilance

The ground truth of how pharmaceutical industry has evolved over the past decade is the large surge in increased specialization and sophistication. In this series we will focus on specialist careers in pharmaceutical industry, lets start with pharmacovigilance.

No medicine which is effective is 100% safe, but the adverse/side effects of a drug have to be weighed against the benefits of the drug. For example a drug treating terminal disease like cancer can have some adverse effects like vomiting and hair loss, but still it would be approved given the gravity of disease it is used to treat. Drug safety function focuses on measurement, prediction, reporting and evaluating safety signals. There are several roles in this domain namely :

  • Drug safety physician
  • Safety specialist
  • Safety informatics expert
  • Safety information expert
If you are good at either synthesising medical information/research finding or have great analytical capabilities to drill down into complex safety data this area of specialization is very suitable and lucrative for you.

2 comments:

  1. Hi,
    it was a useful read for a person who is just a student and needs to be assured that different possibilites exist for life science professionals.

    However, i am a working professional, a research scientist in Pharmacology at a leading research centre in Mumbai, and planning to make a career change. As you have stated in the post , i do have a ability to synthese medical information/research finding, analytical capabilities to drill down into complex safety data. I would like to get to know details like growth opportunities in career, common renumuration, industry wise(pharma, CRo etc..,)employment opportunities etc. Where can i get such information

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  2. Thanks for contacting us regarding the opportunities in life sciences. You are correct that this website/blog is more focused on students and has limited information on the specialists in this area. Please check our website : www.clinnovo.com, you will be able to find the job openings and remuneration packages.

    There is no defined website with all information on career paths, kindly let us which career path you would be interested in.

    ReplyDelete