Entering medical writing from an adjacent profession
Health education, teaching, research and clinical translation can involve writing before it becomes a person's main occupation. Entry into medical writing can grow from those responsibilities and the skills developed through them.
Health education
Planning and developing written health education materials is a core competency of health educators, for which a public health master's in community health education provides preparation. Entry-level health educator posts are likely to require these skills.
One health educator began by heading a disease management and patient education materials development division in a large healthcare system, creating both provider materials and low-literacy patient education. A later university role developed her experience in grant writing and peer-reviewed publication and enabled collaboration with government agencies and community nonprofits. She enjoyed consulting on projects that interested her and then moving to different subjects.
Teaching and research coordination
A graduate in English and chemistry moved from school teaching to a research laboratory at the Texas Heart Institute because she missed science. She applied for a laboratory coordinator role in 1976 despite lacking knowledge of artificial hearts, reasoning that interview practice would be useful even if she was unsuccessful.
Her English background led engineers and physician trainees to ask her to edit and eventually write grants, contracts and manuscripts. Writing and editing became the main part of her work and the catalyst for her career change. After she spent about six years working directly with a leading surgeon, the institute recognised that other academic and clinical researchers needed similar support and established a scientific publications department, which she headed.
Statistical reporting in special-needs teaching
A special-needs teacher spent seven years writing long narrative progress reports based on statistical comparisons of each child's performance with norms. She enjoyed the writing enough to prepare reports for other teachers and sought a career that would use those skills.
In 1980, she found a medical writing opening at a pharmaceutical company as companies were recruiting writers in response to FDA rules on writing and submitting clinical study reports. The move led to both regulatory and publication writing.
Clinical translation
An applied languages graduate who had studied German, French and Spanish with interpreting and translation began interviewing European physicians in their own languages about prescribing practices after graduating in 1975. He began his medical writing career in 1977 and moved into clinical translation at a pharmaceutical company in Germany, later leading clinical translation, medical writing and registration within its German sales office.
His clinical trial documentation required more than literal translation: clarity of thought, structural coherence, scientific judgement and linguistic precision were part of the work. He subsequently became a freelance medical writer, editor and international trainer specialising in medical language.