Clinical research jobs - both overqualified and not enough UK experience

[Sirine1708]

Good morning, any advise would be appreciated.

I have a degree in Pharmaceutical Sciences from another country and we moved to the UK in 2023. As it was a rather unplanned move, so I had to help my DC to settle in British school, learn language etc. Before that, I was working in clinical research in international companies, but left 5 years ago to be a stay at home parent.

Never had issues with finding jobs before, but I started applying to entry-level positions here like CTA / coordinator that required only degree and nothing else and get rejected straight away. At the same time I don't have UK experience to qualify for more advanced positions ie regulatory. And I don't want to be a CRA because of travel.

I started in February and now reached the point when I'm thinking to lie on my CV to at least get a call from a real person. But I don't even know what's the main issue - is it the gap in employment, overqualification or lack of experience here.

It might be none of those things. Has anyone looked at your job applications for you to check you’re doing them the right way?

Lack of recent references/work history might be an issue. Would any of your old colleagues/managers have any useful info?

Oh and don’t lie on your CV. That’s definitely not the answer 🙄

@JessJesss not really. But we went through various applications for my husband and I was reviewing his CV and cover letter so I was feeling quite confident about my applications.
I get contacted for more advanced positions via LinkedIn, so my profile is more or less OK for them, but they need UK experience wich I'm denied any chance to obtain. Don't think if I get a job in Sainsbury's it will really help for CV :))

Have you spoken with any of the UK clinical research recruitment companies directly? Recruiters (good ones!) would be well placed to let you know what jobs you would be qualified for and help you construct your application. If you PM me, I can give you thr names of a couple of companies I'd recommend (I am senior level in clinical research in the UK). Would you take short-term contracts to build your experience?

Work in the UK is getting harder in my experience. I employ people, different field and have found in the last year no of applicants is through the roof. A role which would attract 30 or 40 applicants now attracts 120 plus, our roles require apecifc qualifications so these are suitable applicants.

Realistically, I would interview someone with UK experience over someone without. Unless there was someone absolutely outstanding on the CV.

@NeverDropYourMooncup the colleagues that I'm still in contact with can't help even themselves. They referred me for few UK jobs internally but I got rejected because of the lack of UK experience.
But I was not messaging my Linkedin "contact network" extensively because I was not in contact with most of people there for long time, especially with the ones who became "high flyers" and it feels awkward to messsage them now.

@Marchitectmummy do you look through those 120 CVs yourself?
At one company, Parexel, I get rejected constantly at 5-5:15 am so it feels like maybe they oursource it and I get rejected just because don't fit exactly into the "frame" and I just can't break through this selection process.

Thank you!
I get contacted for CRA positions few times a month but most of recruiters disappear after I say I'm interested in any other position but not this one.
I had a chat with one recruitment company, though don't think they are huge and the feedback I received there's nothing wrong with me except this gap in the employment.
I would take any type of contract, can't see myself doing nothing in 5 years.

Have you considered academia rather than industry? There is a huge network of Clinical Trials Units based within Universities which may be an option?

Hello! I work in clinical research so maybe I can help.

What kind of roles have you done before? Project manager, data manager, regulatory? What research areas - oncology, medical imaging, something else?

I work for a US company (remote) while based in the UK, so that could be one option if you want to work in industry/corporate.

Another option might be academic research - if you look at jobs.ac.uk for “clinical trial unit” you’ll get various university-based roles. Trial Coordinator, data manager, trial assistants/administrators etc. These jobs will probably be slightly less competitive than corporate roles (but still a great place to work usually!).

Third option would be clinical research in the NHS. Search NHS jobs for “clinical research” or “clinical trial”. You will see trial coordinator/practitioner jobs. Usually recruiting patients onto trials, and all the associated trial coordination etc.

I think the whole CRA/travelling structure is less of a thing in the UK. There might be one medical monitor at a trials unit that travels and does site monitoring. But the entry-level jobs are more like trial administrator, data manager, etc.

Regarding the UK experience, I don’t think it would matter enormously for an NHS or academic trials unit role. My advice would be:

1. Do a Good Clinical Practice (GCP) course. I expect you can find one of these online.

2. Have a little research into UK regulatory stuff (the MHRA, IRAS submissions, etc).

Then you can write in your applications “while I have not worked in a UK role before, I am familiar with the……. Etc” and write a bit about what you’ve learned from self-research.

The job descriptions should also list the type of things you need to be familiar with, so you can research based on that.

I couldn't find anything like that in London, but maybe I was not looking too closely at Universities.

@EchoGreen I was CRA, then In-House CRA that combined CTA and Start up specialist roles and a bit of everything else, they were even starting doing remote monitoring when I left. All kind of areas because I was working in 5-8 trials at the same time, like for 0.1-0.4 PTA.
Started NHS application but was stuck at "personal statement" and decided to do it proprly after holidays because if even NHS rejects me my self-esteem will be totally destroyed.

I'll read about MHRA, IRAS, thank you.

Definitely agree doing Good Clinical Practice Training (available via the NIHR) would strengthen your CV.
Similarly the suggestion of understanding the UK regulatory system for both drug and non drug studies.

I teach Clincial Trials and often point students to the Clinical Trials Toolkit and UK Trial Managers Network efficient guide to trial management as useful resources for understanding the UK landscape.
There are also courses available on Trials Management which may be helpful.

If you have monitoring experience I would make sure this is clear in your CV. This isn't something a lot of people have experience of and is always a bonus to see when interviewing.

Most registered CTUs are part UK Clincial Research Collaborative so worth a search for that to see which institutions might be worth looking at for jobs.

Good luck with it!

Working in clinical research in the NHS can actually be fab, really nice to work directly with patients. Even if you only did it for 9 months-1 year, it would be good to get the relevant UK experience.

@YorkshireGoddess thanks, I've had a lot of GCP trainings before but refresher will not hurt for the CV, as well as other courses. At least I'll know that I've done everything that I could :)

Thank you!

As there's so many specialists here, maybe you can help me with another question - what brands of eCRF, eTMF and CTMS systems are now the most popular?

I’ve been out of academic research for a few years, but when I did work in an academic trials unit we were still simply using computer document files as the eTMF, and for some studies still meticulously maintaining the paper TMF as the main record…. Specific TMF software was talked about in a wistful
sort of way, but too expensive. Ditto when I worked in NHS research. I would be interested to hear from others if this has changed in the last few years. That’s one way that academic & NHS trial units will differ from
pharma/CROs.

For eCRF, OpenClinica or MACRO, but I think every unit will use slightly different software (even between studies), so it should be enough to just say you’re well experienced at using various eCRF software and list a few. Again, some trials may still be using paper CRFs.

@EchoGreen that's really interesting, thank you!

I use REDCap for eCRFs, Windows filing for a eTMF however I believe there is some eTMF software currently in development

Veeva Vault is one of the main eTMF providers or Phlexglobal. A lot of the CROs now have their own TMF systems.

I would agree with the previous poster who suggested speaking to some recruiters, and also applying to CROs if you haven't already as a lot of them will take entry level applicants.

My company and a lot of
our clients are using Veeva Vault for all of those services at the moment. Medidata still somewhat.

Look at CROs as they seem to favour remote working and it may give you more options, link with a lot of CR recruiters on LinkedIn, I see quite a lot of study start up specialist roles open, also may be look out for remote trip report reviewing roles or central monitoring where you review the data remotely as that is an expanding area without the travel of a CRA.

Good luck!

I've been a recruiting manager for both Medidata and Veeva. They don't really hire people without experience well except to their graduate programs. Have you thought about a role in Data Management? It's not a huge jump from a CRA role. So rather than checking data at source, you'll check it via the EDC platform?