What can a medical writer do?
To begin with, let me clarify who is a medical writer or health communicator. These writers write, edit, or generate written material related to medicine and health. To do this, they research, collect, classify, and organize, interpret, and present the information in a way that is easily understandable by their target audience.
The role of a medical writer
A medical communicator or writer as a professional plays the role of;
- Writer
- editors
- concealers
- journalists
- Project Manager
- media producers
- public relations specialist
- editors
- educators
- researchers
- translators
Some medical communicators also do marketing or corporate communications work.
Where can a health writer get a job?
Medical writers or communicators work in several areas. These areas are;
- Pharmaceutical industries: involved in the research, development, and manufacturing of drugs, biotechnological products, and medical devices.
- Agencies such as CROs (Contract Research Organizations), medical education companies that develop educational programs for doctors, pharmacists, nurses, and other health care providers, medical communication, and advertising or public relations.
- Health care facilities, including university medical centers, hospitals or health care systems, and managed care organizations.
- Non-profit organizations
- Medical publishers such as magazines, textbooks, websites, and patient education
What do you write?
As a medical communicator, you are expected to research, read, organize, interpret, and collect;
- newspaper articles
- Abstracts, posters and slide shows for scientific meetings
- Grant Proposals
- Chapters for medical textbooks
- Regulatory documents on investigational new drug (IND) documents, new drug application (NDA) submissions, clinical trial reports, etc.
- sales training material
- Materials for lay audiences and patients in the form of magazines, newspapers, web articles, brochures, books, and other educational materials.
With this background it is clear that not all Medical Communicators are the same. There are two types of medical writers, scientific medical writers and marketing medical writers.
Science health communicators have an advanced medical degree and extensive experience writing scientific journal articles. The projects that these writers handle are journal abstracts, journal articles, medical speeches, medical education materials, regulatory documents, internet or web content, etc.
Health marketing writers focus on marketing. The jobs or projects that these writers handle are copywriting, articles, internet content, proposal writing, training manuals, medical script writing, magazine articles, newsletters, etc.
In the end, no matter what type of projects or writing assignments you handle as a medical communicator or medical writer, your ultimate goal is to present accurate, informative, and easily understandable medical content.