SEAK faculty member who is an experienced physician in Pharmaceutical Industry answers the question: What does a medical director in a pharmaceutical company typically do?
Typically, what a medical director does, is, it’s someone who focuses more inwardly on the company. They oversee clinical trial development in terms of protocol development. What endpoints are being looked at? Are those endpoints clinically meaningful? Meaning, once they do a clinical trial to show that a product is safe and effective, will physicians actually appreciate the endpoints that they’ve proved or will they think that they are just good research tools?
They also work on reviewing the safety and effectiveness data as it becomes available to make sure that a product is not going to hurt anybody. It will actually help them. Then, once the clinical trials are completed, will review that information for the regulatory submissions o get that product approved. They will also look at how that information is then reflected in the marketing materials and brochures and physician education programs that would be developed. On the phase 4, post medical directors will still be focused on product development, usually expanding the indications for a product that is on the market currently.