Pari Shahrezaei, PharmD
Medical Science Liaison
Pari completed her BSc in Anatomy and Cell Biology at McGill University before completing her PharmD at the University of Waterloo. Pari has a specific interest in supporting dermatological and rheumatological patient care through customer-centric interactions.
*The views and opinions expressed in this profile are those of the professional and do not necessarily reflect the official policies of their employer.
Tell us about your career path
Pharma is really special, you have the ability to move around within it as long as you have a strong medical background. There are a lot of places you can move your career, whether it be towards the commercial or medical pharmaceuticals. This is something that is really important to me, I’m someone who likes to learn and know a little bit of everything.
I’m convinced that you can never be bored with a career in pharma. I didn’t necessarily know that I was going to get into exactly when I started in the Medical Information Associate role, but it became a natural transition for me with my background as a pharmacist and experience providing drug information to patients. It became second nature for me to do it in this role, and I have since transitioned to a Medical Science Liaison position.
Tell us more about the Medical Information Associate role
This role is typically within a medical team, serving as an important touchpoint between external stakeholders such as healthcare practitioners and patients. Additionally, a focus of this role is to create medically reviewed scientific communication materials for use in medical education programs, advisory boards, and sales training. You also work on a multitude of different projects, depending on business needs.
What does a typical day look like as a Medical Information Associate?
Just start - put your foot in the water and just start networking. Go to whatever events, join organizations like the S2BN, message people on LinkedIn.
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There is no typical day for me, it’s always different and the role is very dynamic. My core responsibilities on a day-to-day basis mainly focus on answering requests from HCPs and patients. When a sales representative in the field receives a medical question from a health care provider that they cannot answer themselves (maybe because it is off-label, or they don’t have the information out in the field), the question is forwarded to me and I connect with the HCP directly to respond.
I also have the responsibility of answering calls that are escalated through our customer response line for the therapeutic areas I support. Besides answering questions, I’m often reviewing medical material that the company is putting out promotionally to make sure that everything we are claiming is accurate and fair.
What other advice can you give graduate students who would like to pursue careers in this industry?
The number one thing that graduate students should be doing right now is networking. The skills I gained from networking helped me immensely when it came time to interview for a job. Medical Affairs (or any other sector) means something different to every company, so just getting out there and talking to as many people as I could help me learn a lot about the role.
Although it can be intimidating, just get out there and start; show up to any networking events on your radar, join professional associations like S2BN, and start cold messaging people on LinkedIn to speak with them and learn from them. Your name will stick, and make you much more visible later on when you start applying to jobs.
I’d also suggest you start honing your skills in graduate school. If you know you’ll be applying to a technical position, make sure you have all of the skills required and are familiar with all of the relevant information surrounding that role. For me, that meant understanding how regulatory bodies work, how to do research on drug discovery, and how clinical trials are carried out, to name a few.
Furthermore, follow specific companies of interest, check their websites frequently for updates, and keep up to date with the literature. Also, take a look at each company’s Twitter feed to see what is currently important to them and to see what types of research are taking place.
What are the biggest challenges and rewards that come with the Medical Information Associate role?
When I started, a big challenge was learning how to balance my workload and meetings that I’d have to attend. Initially, I was called into many meetings and I felt that I needed to attend them all but I’ve developed a sense of what meetings are most important for my role. Now, I’m able to allocate my time more efficiently by choosing to solely attend the meetings in which I can provide and/or gain value.
As a ‘yes’ person, I’ve learned to use my time for the most important tasks because it’s impossible to do everything effectively. I’m also part of one of the few departments that really connect with patients and healthcare practitioners. As a result, I’m able to really get in their shoes and understand their pain points. I really get to see how a particular drug is making a difference in a patient’s life. Furthermore, I’m fortunate to work with people from different backgrounds and areas of expertise.
S2BN