Jenn, Director of Health Economics, Market Access and Reimbursment
I lead the market access team of a major pharmaceutical company, and our mission is to achieve patient access to our innovative treatments.
I have a BSc in Biology/Biochemistry, an MBA in Finance, and a PostGrad in Pharmacoeconomics. I have worked as:
and now as the Market Access Director at a pharmaceutical company in the UK.
Catching up with internal colleagues, answering emails, visiting important external customers such as NICE or the Government, and drinking lots of coffee!
I have always been in the area of health economics and market access, with increasingly more senior roles. I started out at an analyst level, worked up to an associate, then to a full economist, a senior economist, then a regional market access role, head of department, and now director.
When my uncle sadly died of AIDS in 1994, the year before the first reverse transcriptase drug came out that transformed AIDS from a death sentence to a chronic disease. I feel very proud of the fact that our industry had the power to do this.
Usually part of a team.
Very collaborative and friendly.
Without a doubt, achieving NICE approval for our prostate cancer drug, abiraterone. I spent four years on this, and everyone thought it wasn’t possible.
Yes – if you want to be in health economics, you need a health economics degree – trust me, you will never be out of a job – this is an area of high demand!
Not sure where the road will take me – but what I can say for sure is I believe strongly in this industry’s ability to make a difference to science and to patients, and so whatever I do next will most definitely be in health and science.
Resilience, integrity and a strong scientific background – it is a tough job trying to obtain access for innovative medicines in this country, and you have to want to keep fighting, always with the patient in your mind.
The commercial pressures in the industry, I would say.
Make sure that you have a love of science and the best interest of the patient at heart.