Welcome!

Hi all! Happy-belated New Year. What a rough year it’s been for everyone – lots of tragic news. It can only go north from here. It’s time for an update, and today I will be discussing some news at Astellas and my initial thoughts on the final semester of the program.

Astellas

Nearing the end of my internship, I was offered a role in Astellas’ market access division duly named Patient Access & Government Relations. These days, market access is a “hot topic” because of the evolving pricing regulations set forth by Canada’s PMPRB. For a long time, the pharmaceutical landscape was pretty stable and predictable concerning pricing guidelines. Now, things are uncertain and companies are looking for ways to respond tactfully to the newer guidelines that are periodically being released. In North America as a whole, soaring drug prices is a topic of conversation especially with the upcoming elections in the USA. You’d think the entire populace is planning a crackdown on pharma.

Another factor to consider is the entry of biosimilars into the market. Biosimilars are to biologics what generics are to small molecule drugs. There’s a catch though – biosimilars aren’t the same as their reference biologics, but they’re close enough (hence, similar). Biosimilars are roughly 25% cheaper than the brand-name biologics, so this is another threat for pharmaceutical companies to consider as the new decade unfolds.

The role of market access is to help the pharmaceutical company negotiate deals with payers that are favorable for all stakeholders involved, while still abiding by the (newer) rules set forth by regulatory bodies.

So, long story short, I’m looking forward to my year in market access. Already four weeks into it, I can tell you that there are a lot of acronyms to learn. Once that’s out of the way and I’m able to speak the same jargonistic language as my colleagues, things should get much more interesting!

Final Semester (January – April 2020)

The final semester of MBiotech is already underway. Boy, does time fly.

I’m taking two courses this term, one mandatory and one elective. The mandatory course is “Management of Technological Innovation” and the elective is “GAMBiT – Generations of Advanced Medicine: Biologics in Therapy”.

In the former, we discuss Harvard Business Review cases as a class. I won’t lie, this has been interesting and it forces you to think outside the box when trying to understand why certain events unfolded the way they did. You also learn a lot from reading about the strategies and philosophies of highly successful businesses and individuals. Often, the cases are fairly new and will discuss a company or individual that we are all familiar with or interact with daily, and it just makes the content that much more engaging and interesting to read. The professor, Ruben Gaetani, is awesome.

GAMBiT is even better. It’s a small group of ten students from different programs (GAMBiT is not just exclusive to mBiotech), and each week we’re assigned a case study and asked to submit a response to the study while holding a particular stance (regulatory, generics company, originator company, etc.) We meet at the end of the week at a restaurant, and we debate and discuss the case over dinner. It’s a good way to connect with really bright and successful people, and everyone has a different thought process because they’re from different academic backgrounds. So far, I recommend it (even if there wasn’t free dinner)!

The End

Thanks for reading this update. As always, if you have any questions for me, I am always reachable by email (ramisnazir@gmail.com).