187 - Infectious Ambitions: A Pharmacist's Career Pivot from Clinical to Industry
HelixTalk - Rosalind Franklin University's College of Pharmacy Podcast
Sean P. Kane, PharmD, BCPS
5 • 644 Ratings
🗓️ 23 January 2025
⏱️ 40 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this episode, we interview Morgan Anderson, PharmD, BCIDP, a graduate of the RFUMS College of Pharmacy, about her career path from a pharmacy resident, emergency medicine specialist, infectious diseases specialist, and now a medical sciences liaison.
The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely Dr. Anderson’s own and do not necessarily reflect the views, positions, or policies of her employer. This podcast is conducted in a personal capacity, and any reference to her professional background is for context only.
Key Concepts
- Having a wide breadth of skills and making yourself marketable is important when transitioning between jobs or career paths. Skills like communication and teamwork can be improved and are applicable to a wide variety of careers within pharmacy.
- Medical Science Liaisons (MSLs) are a common role for pharmacists in the pharmaceutical industry. MSLs are field-based roles within the medical affairs department of the company. MSLs are medical and scientific experts who build collaborative relationships with key thought leaders, facilitate exchange of scientific information and insights, and serve as a conduit between these thought leaders and other areas of the company.
- Two common career paths to pharmacists becoming an MSL are via a fellowship program or after years in clinical practice. A fellowship program provides a more structured approach, including mentoring and networking, with access to a variety of areas of the company outside of medical affairs. A pathway after clinical practice is more self-directed with less structure, but provides pharmacists with a strong clinical background that can be helpful in an MSL role.
- Being a scientific communicator, possessing strong emotional intelligence, and being adaptable are critical soft skills that are essential for success in an MSL role. These soft skills can be improved with practice!
References
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to Helix Talk, an educational podcast for healthcare students and providers covering real-life clinical pearls, professional pharmacy topics, and drug therapy discussions. |
| 0:11.0 | This podcast is provided by pharmacists and faculty members at Rosal Franklin University College of Pharmacy. |
| 0:17.0 | This podcast contains general information for educational purposes only. This is not professional |
| 0:22.4 | advice and should not be used in lieu of obtaining advice from a qualified health care provider. |
| 0:27.2 | And now on to the show. Welcome to Helix Talk episode 187. I'm your co-host Dr. Kane. |
| 0:36.1 | And I'm Dr. Patel. And the title of today's episode is |
| 0:39.4 | Infectious Ambitions, a pharmacist's career pivot from clinical to industry. And in today's |
| 0:44.8 | episode, I'm very excited to introduce Dr. Morgan Anderson, Farm D, BCIDP, who is actually an alumnus |
| 0:51.0 | of our program and has a very interesting career past so far since she graduated |
| 0:54.8 | from our program in 2015. And as a fun fact, Dr. Anderson was actually literally the first person |
| 1:00.9 | who matriculated into our pharmacy school back in 2011, which is a pretty cool claim to fame, |
| 1:06.0 | in my opinion. Oh, I agree. I knew that she was, she was a graduate from the very first class, but I did not know that she was the first admitted. That makes you even more special, Dr. Anderson. |
| 1:17.9 | Thank you. Dr. Anderson, why don't we start with your educational background in terms of, you know, you graduated from Rosalind Franklin University in 2015. Could you tell us about some of your career paths and where you're at right now? |
| 1:30.9 | Sure, I'd be happy to. |
| 1:32.4 | I graduated like you said in the first class. |
| 1:36.0 | So I graduated in 2015. |
| 1:38.6 | And then I moved on to two years of pharmacy residency. |
| 1:42.3 | So my first year was done at Abbott Northwestern, which is in |
| 1:46.8 | Minneapolis, Minnesota. And then I did a second year in infectious diseases at Northwestern |
| 1:51.6 | Memorial through the Midwestern College of Pharmacy program. Those hospitals are not affiliated. |
| 1:57.2 | They just have similar names. After that, I moved into a role as an emergency |
| 2:02.3 | medicine pharmacist at Advocate Condell Medical Center, which is in Libertyville, Illinois, and then |
... |
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