Clinical Trial Coordinator/ Clinical Research Associate Review

As a CTC I would do administrative tasks for the clinical trial teams, such as running reports for the study team meetings, localising informed consent forms specific for each site and sending essential documents to the sites to be filed in the investigator site files. As a CRA I would go on site visits with my CRA mentor where we would assess the site files for any missing documents or mistakes that need correcting and liase with the Investigators, study nurses and pharmacists involved in the trial.

I have had the opportunity to develop my communication skills by regularly communicating with the study teams during the study team meetings and by discussing queries with documents in the site files with the research nurses at the sites. I have also developed my organisation by prioritings my CTC workload based on the urgencies and deadlines of each task and then also by combining the CTC work with the CRA work during the second half of the placement.

As an intern, the overall responsibility for the trials you are invloved in must be on your mentor, however most tasks I completed individually and were very important as they ensured the clinical trials ran smoothly. For example, localising and sending essential documents to site was very important. Without an essential document like the informed consents, patients could not consent to participate on the trial and so by being given this task I ultimately held a lot of responsibility and felt that I played a critical role in the conduct of the trials.

I felt that I had a lot of support and guidance during my time at MSD. I worked very closely alongside my CTC mentor and could go to her with any questions I might have. During the second half of the placement I worked closely with my CRA mentor as well who guided me through the CRA job role. Each intern was also given a CRM manager who we would have weekly catch ups with and discuss our progress, any concerns and anything else we would like to get out of the placement.

Despite the majority of my placement being remote, everyone in the GCTO department was very friendly and welcoming. The CTC's would have weekly catch ups and run social events such as 'virtual through the keyhole'. If we were able to go into the office then I expect the atmosphere would have been even more friendly as I've been told that previous interns held baking competitions. The whole team defintiely tried their best to make the interns welcome and keep morale high despite the circumstances.

I've really loved my time at MSD and am so glad that I've done this placement. I've enjoyed working alongside 7 other interns and developing our own little team. I've also loved learning more about the roles within clinical trials and seeing how my university learning is applied to the real world. I personally would have also enjoyed a placement within a laboratory as I am looking to have a career in research, and so for me this placement lacked that highliy scientific element.

Yes

Go for it! It's a really great company to work for. Make sure you have a basic understanding of the clinical trial phases as this was one question I was asked during my telephone interview. For the main interview, just be yourself and show that you would work well in a team and are easy to get on with. Prepare to be asked competency based questions and prepare examples of scenarios when you have shown those specific skills.