Working as a Principal Investigator
Dr. Melissa Choi is a Family Medicine physician and board-certified Obesity Medicine specialist in Minnesota. Despite knowing she always wanted to practice part-time, she is now a Principal Investigator working full-time and is very fulfilled in her career choice.
She enjoyed the preventive medicine aspects of family medicine and co-founded a medical weight management practice where she gained experience leading teams and training staff. Unfortunately, the Covid-19 pandemic negatively impacted her weight management practice; the clinic was “hibernated” and she went through a short period of being furloughed. This experience clarified for her the lack of control she had over her career as a physician and she decided to actively control her own destiny.
Working with a physician business coach, she considered building a side business and also learned to consider different ways of “viewing the world”; topics such as understanding your audience and public speaking.
A blind outreach from a recruiter via LinkedIn about a Clinical Research physician captured her attention and she has been in this role since July 2021. She is a “Principal Investigator” (or PI) for an independent research site. Her main responsibility is “subject safety and quality data collection”. Melissa works with phase 1-3 clinical trial conduct where she follows the clinical trial protocol, focusing on inclusion and exclusion criteria. She utilizes her medical expertise and experience daily to evaluate adverse events and determine if they are related to the investigational product (IP).
Regarding her transition to the Clinical Research physician, Melissa has found that her broad range of expertise as a family medicine physician has been an asset and positioned her to oversee a variety of trials. She has participated in clinical trials in multiple therapeutic areas including vaccines, diabetes, lipid lowering agents and NASH (just a few examples!). Her words of wisdom for physicians considering a transition:
“we all went to medical school and we have expertise – there is a role for you; you have to paint the picture to show that you can do what they are looking for in the job description”
“if you want to shift to a nonclinical role you have to be comfortable that you won’t get the first several jobs you apply for – and in most cases it’s a good thing because you WANT to be a good fit for what the company is looking for; think of it as a match between you and the company and you want it to be a good fit!”
“work with a coach – there are a lot of blind spots and limiting beliefs that I learned about myself by working with a coach. Don’t be afraid to ask for help; being a doctor doesn’t mean you have to know everything!”
Ready to make a career transition to pharma/biotech… want to explore a way to use your medical training and knowledge in a fulfilling way without nights and weekends call or charting. Watch this webinar on Getting Past the Three Major Hurdles to a Career in the Pharma Industry HERE