Medical Affairs Organization- MAPS

  External Education led by Medical Affairs is critical to provide unbiased education to enhance healthcare professional (HCP) knowledge, skills and competencies through funding for independent medical education or industry-led medical education that addresses identified knowledge or competency and performance gaps. The goals of the External Education   FAWG   are as follows: Ensure understanding of the current state of external medical education as it relates to the Medical Affairs function, and the needs of Medical Affairs professionals Raise awareness among Medical Affairs professionals of the value of external medical education in the biopharmaceutical/device industry Facilitate the evolving role of Medical Affairs professionals in external medical education in response to the changing landscape Provide tools and solutions to Medical Affairs professionals to help design and execute compliant and impactful external medical education programs Activities: We organize Ext...

  After returning to the UK after five years working as an outback doctor in Australia, David Williams had culture shock. Instead of diving back into practice, he joined Boehringer Ingelheim as a medical advisor, working through many roles to find the best fit. Twenty one years later, he’d been Real-World Evidence lead for Sanofi, held positions in China, and had worked in various regional/country Medical Director positions. “I did my apprenticeship from the base, up,” David says. Here MAPS speaks with David about the need for a new, personalized approach to engaging healthcare providers and other key opinion leaders, and how VISFO could help lead this effort. MAPS:  David, how in the world did you decide Medical Affairs professionals should be able to read minds? David:  At VISFO we’re very nerdy – like the  Big Bang Theory  but more so. With tongue in cheek and a British sense of humor, we had conversations in the office around,  If you could have any sup...

  ABSTRACT In the Medical Affairs Professional Society (MAPS) community, external medical education can be categorized based on the extent of influence and industry involvement; however, it should always have the ultimate goal of optimizing patient care and improving health outcomes. Medical Affairs (MA) professionals take the lead to reach this goal by establishing external education programs to address knowledge, competency, or performance gaps. Educational strategies are implemented while fully complying with all applicable laws and codes and considering variables such as regional differences. External medical education demands are continuously evolving, and MA needs to continue to evolve with these changes to establish effective education strategies. Furthermore, the swift change to virtual education platforms due to the current COVID-19 pandemic requires speed and agility across stakeholders. The adaptation of medical education tactics will ensure effective healthcare professi...

  In most cases, professionals across all industries aren’t much concerned with the definition of success. And the same is true for Medical Affairs — people are far more focused on achieving success than understanding it. However, anyone seeking to tap into their full potential must give the broader concept of success more than a passing thought. This is not an easy task, as success is an esoteric concept — it evades easy definition and is widely susceptible to subjectivity. Ask any number of people what success is, and you’re likely to get just as many different answers. To a certain degree, this is only natural — a baseball player will have a different view on success than a medical liaison and other metrics by which they measure it. In this article, however, we won’t concern ourselves with individual, goal-based approaches to success. Instead, we will look at the neuroscience behind the notion of success in general — and how a different, more thought-out approach to our behavior...

  SUCCESS: THE ULTIMATE ICEBERG Before delving into the neuroscientific research of success, it’s important to ask another, more general question: how does success manifest itself in practice? How do we perceive it in others, and how do we recognize it in ourselves? There are many possible answers to this, but one is particularly visually enticing: the iceberg concept. An oft-repeated visualization of success is a polar iceberg — with a tiny part protruding from the water and a vast mountainous mass beneath the surface, invisible to the casual observer. And that’s just what it appears like to outside spectators. When we notice a strikingly successful person, they often appear to be geniuses or people with some sort of inherent advantage that the rest of us lack. As anyone who has achieved any manner of success could tell you, the truth is very different — and that’s as true for Medical Affairs as it is for stand-up comedy, police work, or politics. Succeeding in any kind of field t...