Archives: Speakers

Shawn Murtough is an EU Qualified Person. Having graduated with a doctorate in pharmaceutical microbiology, he has worked in various roles within the pharmaceutical industry for the last nineteen years. He has over ten years’ experience working as a qualified person with both traditional small molecule drug products and novel therapies. In recent years he has specialised in cold chain logistics for clinical trials. This has entailed handling a wide range of product types including, cell therapies, viral vectors, monoclonal antibodies and vaccines.

Christen McGown is the Senior Manager of Comparator Sourcing for ICS. In her current role, Christen manages the strategic, operational and customer service activities of the Comparator Sourcing team. Leading a fully-dedicated specialist comparator team, Christen is responsible for advancing process and service improvements to help clients better manage the cost of clinical trials.

Christen has more than 15 years of experience in operations and account management. Holding positions in Sales Development and Supervisor of Comparator Operations, Christen is instrumental in leading her team’s continuous efforts to simplify comparator drug access across the U.S.

Christen holds a Bachelor of Business Administration in Marketing from University of North Texas, Denton, Texas.

After  25+ years’ experience in the digitalization of clinical trials, the active participation of Benoît in the public-private consortium EHR4CR (Electronic Health Record for Clinical Research) has made him realize that there is a lot of value in all the data collected in the routine clinical setting and we should really maximize such usage in the best interest of medical research and thus the patients. Nevertheless, that is only achievable if we involve the patients in the most trustable, transparent and privacy respectful way.  Through his participation to Partners for Patients,  Benoît ambitions to promote the various approaches going in such a direction.

BSc. Life Science graduated in the University of Barcelona, ​​specialized in Hematology and Biochemistry and Teaching Laboratory Practices during 3 years.

With almost 30  years working in Pharma Industry, I have been evolving into different positions in the area of clinical research and technologies and leading innovation projects. The current position is Head Clinical Data and Information Management. Nowadays, working on strategies partnerships to improve the digitalization of clinical trials and data visualization.

Robert Greene, Founder and President HungerNdThirst Foundation, Board Member European Cancer Patient Coalition, Patient Advisory Committee Members European Cancer Organisation and Patient Advisory Board Member Data Saves Lives.

An Advocate for a more patient centred and patient-centric approach in care and clinical trials.

Dr Martin O’Kane MRPharmS is Unit Manager of the Clinical Trials Unit in the Licensing Division of the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).  He studied pharmacy at University of Aston and after completing a PhD in pharmacology and post-doctorate neuroscience research project at the University of Glasgow, moved to Japan to work within the pharmaceutical industry. He joined the MHRA in 2005 as a Pharmacopoeial Scientist within the British Pharmacopoeia and moved to the MHRA Clinical Trials Unit as a Pharmaceutical Assessor in 2007.  He became Unit Manager of the Clinical Trials Unit in November 2015 and has been actively involved in development of new clinical trials policy, systems and procedures and well as the UKs exit from the EU. Most recently he has been involved in supporting expedited approval of, and guidance for, clinical trials for COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics and supporting the recovery and resilience of non-COVID trials.

Pavlina Walter is the Global Clinical Operations Lead, with expertise in rare disease (PW, HIO) pediatrics and medical devices.  For 15 years, Pavlina has been responsible for management of Central & Eastern European region and USA in regard to projects set up, execution, oversight and reporting, providing local strategic planning and organization to achieve successful studies completion. Pavlina holds an Executive MBA. Managing Director and owner of Shasta medical company, providing consulting for American biotech companies in CEE.

Dr. Bernard Hamelin M.D. has more than 25 years of experience in France and abroad in the fields of clinical development and medical affairs at AstraZeneca and Sanofi pharmaceutical companies. In recent years, his work has focused on real-life health related data and digital platforms to accelerate research and clinical development and to improve the generation of evidence supporting the access and marketing of innovative molecules.

The convergence between recent discoveries in molecular and cellular biology and the digital transformation resulting from access to large amounts of health-related data has led pharmaceutical companies to revisit the planning and conduct of clinical studies. The use of these data has also made it possible to better communicate to health authorities and health care professionals the risks and benefits observed by patient sub-groups. Finally, the integration of data from various sources, such as the patient’s behaviors and preferences and the management of care systems has made it possible to develop more robust predictive models. Thanks to his experience and the links he has been able to create with institutional and private data providers and digital companies, Bernard is today considered as an expert by the industry of real-world data.

A member of the French National Society of Liver and Digestive diseases, Bernard Hamelin has acquired medical expertise in several other therapeutic areas such as immunology, oncology, rare diseases, respiratory and cardio-vascular diseases.

Morten completed his Master’s degree in Biotechnology at National University of Ireland, Galway, in 1997, specializing in Pharmacology. He joined Lundbeck in August 2020 as VP, Head of Clinical Operations.

Career to date Morten started at a CRO in 1997 as a CRA on an Epilepsy study.  In the subsequent years he worked in CRO’s, consultancy and big Pharma taking on roles within Project Management, Program Oversight, Innovation and Strategic Partnerships.  He joined Pfizer in 2003 and has a wide range of project management experience delivering projects across multiple therapeutic areas. From 2007 to 2011 he held a leadership role in Pfizer’s Clinical Study Management group providing Operational Oversight in various outsourcing models.  As Group Lead of Emerging Markets and Established Products Business Units he managed a team of Program Directors in a variety of Therapy Areas from Phase II to Late Phase and Non-Interventional trials. From late 2011 Morten joined an Innovation technology CRO in the role of Senior Director and Head of Strategic Partnerships with the aim of improving Clinical Trial efficiencies and supporting Trial Sites. In August 2016 he joined InVentiv Health as VP, Head of Program Delivery in Neuroscience, before the group merged with INC to become Syneos Health.