About the EMWA Ambassador Programme

Ambassador Programme Careers Talks

Since October 2017, EMWA Ambassadors have appeared at career events in Berlin, Bucharest, London, Munich, Rome, Reading, Stuttgart, and Zurich with more to come.

On this page, we will be providing updates on all Ambassador presentations and our impressions of these events.

If you are interested in becoming an Ambassador, or if you have any information on career events in your vicinity, please contact Abe Shevack at aspscientist@gmail.com or EMWA Head Office at info@emwa.org.

Latest update

On 24 Nov 2023 Nicole Bezuidenhout, Francesca Cappellini, and Catherine Heddle, represented EMWA at the very well attended Aula Medica Chase Career Conference in Stokholm, Sweden.

The exhibition hall was very busy and the EMWA booth had many visitors, with some even queuing up to talk with Nicole, Francesca, and Catherine. Needless to say, they were swamped answering questions, providing information about our organisation, conferences, and initiatives, and answering questions on how to get into medical writing and the situation of medical writing in Sweden. Very few visitors had heard of EMWA before, and Nicole has reported that people have been reaching out on social media since the conference.

Francesa gave a very well-received presentation on Careers in Medical Writing and the benefits of joining EMWA. In addition to answering questions following her talk, she asked for a show of hands as to how many in the audience had heard of medical writing before the talk, and how many wanted to become medical writers after the talk; several hands were raised about becoming a medical writer.

All in all, EMWA’s participation at the conference was a great success, and we look forward to further opportunities to spread the word about medical writing in Sweden.

On 30 Jan 2024, Katrin Zaragoza Dörr (Freelance MW), and Marta Mas (Executive Director Medical Writing, TFS HealthScience) will hold a presentation on “Career in Medical Writing – Bridges to Industry at the Institut de Recerca Biomèdica/Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB) Barcelona, a biomedical research centre. https://www.irbbarcelona.org/en/about-us/what-is-the-irb-barcelona

The event is part of a series organised by the IRB “Bridges to Industry”, a “meet and greet” programme set up by the Innovation Department of the IRB Barcelona. It provides participants the opportunity to meet key professionals in the bio sector and expand and/or consolidate their professional network.

Previous News

The EMWA Ambassador Programme’s is continuing its efforts to reach out to new audiences to promote medical writing and EMWA and has supported the following events:

On 20 Sep 2023 Gökye Ayan, a new member of EMWA, gave a talk to 15 postdocs at the Max Panck Institute for Evolutionary Biology Postdoc Retreat in Plön, Germany. The aim of the meeting was to help postdocs in navigating their career paths. Goyke spoke for 2 hours about her transition into medical writing, the EMWA education programme, conferences, and resources on the EMWA website. She answered questions about the differences between academic and medical writing, the input of medical writers to writing projects, handling of ethical dilemmas, and the impact of AI on medical writing in the future.

On 22 Sept 2023 Abe Shevack gave a short introduction to the Ambassador’s Programme and led a breakout session for participants during the Getting Into Medical Writing online event organized by Evguenia Alechine. This event was well visited online by over 200 participants with speakers from the EC, panels on EMWA offerings and the experiences of networking groups in the UK, Netherlands, France, Germany, Switzerland, Portugal, Italy, and Spain, as well as breakout sessions on different topics.

On 25 Sept 2023 Arunon Sivananthan and Martina Colluci represented EMWA as exhibitors at the NetworkPharma Medcomms Careers Event organised by Peter Llewellyn at the Heathrow Conference Centre. This event was again very well attended with over 500 participants. Arunon and Martina were very busy answering questions about EMWA and the conferences, demonstrating the resources of the EMWA website, as well as discussing questions about careers in medical writing. The conference was a great success and participants both seasoned and aspiring expressed keen interest in how EMWA can bolster their journeys as medical writers.

Foto: Arunon Sivananthan and Martina Colluci representing EMWA at the NetworkPharma Medcomms Careers Event, September 2023.

On 10 Nov 2022, Sarah Choudhury (EMWA Treasurer) along with Ricardo Milho (EMWA Sponsorship Officer) and Arunon Sivananthan (EMWA member) represented EMWA at the NetworkPharma Medcomms Career Event (“Working in and around #MedComms”) that took place at the Radisson Hotel & Conference Centre in London Heathrow.

The event was very well attended with around 500 participants, including employers from Medcomms and Regulatory Writing agencies, and newcomers with diverse backgrounds interested in starting a career in Medical Writing.Sarah, Ricardo, and Arunon manned an exhibitor table at the event and were extremely busy answering many questions about training for medical writers and the benefits of joining EMWA. They demonstrated the resources on the EMWA website and provided promotional information and copies of the EMWA Journal Medical Writing.Sarah also hosted a discussion panel in the afternoon entitled "Meet the Regulatory Writers", with 3 other writers from Regulatory Writing agencies who shared their career journeys and talked about what it is like to work in regulatory writing. Overall, it was a very successful day and we look forward to further collaboration with Peter Llewellyn and NetworkPharma in the future.

If you are an experienced medical writer and EMWA volunteer and are interested in becoming an EMWA Ambassador, or if you know of any upcoming career events in your locality, please contact Abe Shevack (aspscientist@gmail.com).

On 11 June, Sally Hill gave an introduction to medical writing and EMWA for a group of 18 translators, interpreters, editors and copywriters in Utrecht. These language experts were attending a workshop organized by SENSE, the Society of English-language professionals in the Netherlands. Like EMWA, SENSE has special interest groups (SIGs) and the full-day workshop on medical translation, medical editing, and medical writing was organized by the SENSE Medical SIG. Some attendees were old hands while others were at the early stages of their careers. Several expressed an interest in EMWA, and one medical editor based in Germany has already become an EMWA member!

On 22 Mar 2022, Dr Carola Krause gave a virtual presentation on writing the IMPD to an audience of 30 researchers at the SPARK-BIH Educational Forum in Berlin. Carola was joined by Abe Shevack who gave an introduction to medical writing and EMWA. The presentation was very well received and there was much interest in the topic and some interesting questions.