Learn about all the different meanings of scientific communications and how pharmacy is involved.

Name: Joni Bradley

Position: Founder/President/CEO

 

Interview Summary with Joni Bradley

Today we are joined by Joni Bradley, the President and CEO of JB Ashtin, a scientific communications company composed of a team of scientific writers, client service professionals, and marketers who provide premium health care solutions.

 

1. Can you tell us more about your path through pharmacy and how you created your own company?

• Learned about hospital pharmacy roles at a young age through a career night at Lynn Hospital
• Attended Wayne State University for undergrad
• Graduated from the University of Michigan College of Pharmacy’s PharmD program
  • Enjoyed her time at the school until clinical rotations started
  • Realized that dealing with critically ill patients was too heart-breaking to work with day in and day out
• Would have gone into community pharmacy right out of school
  • Having a 3 year old daughter at the time didn’t allow for that
• Wanted to find a job that wouldn’t take away from her family after normal working hours
  • Found a job involving medical writing
  • Attended the American Society of Health System Pharmacists (ASHP) Midyear Clinical Meeting to learn more about the job
  • Had a love for drug information
  • Never had any training with writing outside of English as a freshman in college

2. Did you work for another medical writing company before starting your own business?

• Yes, first started with a small company in New Jersey
  • Owner was also a pharmacist and served as a mentor
  • Had a great team of employees that also helped develop writing skills
  • Worked with this company for about 5 years
• Moved back to Michigan due to family
• Found a second job with a pharmacist that was willing to take a chance on working remotely
  • Worked in Michigan for a Philadelphia-based company
  • Flew back and forth quite a bit
  • Worked at that job for almost 4 years
  • Owner was another great mentor
• The first job taught “What do I do and how do I do it?”
• The second job taught “How do you make a business out of this?”

3. What qualities did you have that allowed you to get those two crucial jobs?

• The ASHP Personal Placement Service was a useful tool
• Networking was definitely important
  • Fairly introverted person so networking wasn’t at the top of her skill set
  • Pharmacy is a very small community and lots of pharmacists know each other

4. How did you go on to start JB Ashtin?

• Would love to say there was a brilliant plan to start, but in reality started with absolutely no plan whatsoever
• After the Philadelphia-based company was sold, the larger company culture was not a good fit
• Had a current client that needed consulting
  • He was a pharmaceutical client
  • Needed to create a global publication group
  • She initially had no idea how to do this, but took the job anyway
  • Had an active pharmacy license to fall back on in case it didn’t work out
  • Worked with this contract for 6 months and learned a lot
• After the contract ended, started freelance writing as a medical writer
  • Former clients started calling and asking for help
  • Organically grew the business this way

5. What is the origin of the name “JB Ashtin” and what is the overall mission/purpose?

• “JB” comes from Joni and her husband Bruce
• “Ashtin” is derived from their children, Ashley and Austin
• JB Ashtin is a traditional medical communications company or scientific communications agency
  • Many people don’t understand what that is
• Has been operating now for 18 years
• JB Ashtin makes it easier for our peers (healthcare providers) to make the best treatment decisions for their patients
• Pharmacists can provide the medical information to help other healthcare providers make better decisions
• Provide services to pharmaceutical clients, biotech, healthcare consumer clients, etc.
  • Help them get information about their products, drugs, devices for whoever is going to be using/prescribing them
  • Usually deals with new medications that providers don’t know about
  • Educates on the disease state first, what is new/changing and how the science is evolving
  • Then discusses the new treatments and how they fit into current therapy options

6. What roles do pharmacists have at JB Ashtin?

• Pharmacists are medical writers and scientific directors
• They are the ones actually creating the content
  • Come up with solutions to get the communications out in the best way possible
• An example would be a client that has a medication that is an investigational drug
  • Pharmacists work with the investigators who would be authors on papers/posters
  • Help create the content that gets submitted to a Congress or medical journal
  • Look at the data and help interpret it

7. How is the company changing and what is the future direction?

• The company has to change as technology advances
• When company was first started, medical and scientific journals were in print and circulation was key
  • Today, this no longer applies
  • No longer concerned with subscribers to journals
• How do we get information in front of people that need to see it?
• How do you engage a user/healthcare provider in this high tech world?
  • Recently completed project was with virtual reality (an Oculus Rift)
  • Disease state education project
  • Did all of the research and wrote the script for the VR experience
  • You look through the eyes of the patient, hear her thoughts, see her conversations, and see her challenges

8. What are the most valuable lessons you’ve learned along your journey of creating a business?

• I have made so many mistakes along the way
• 2 main lessons
  • Don’t be afraid to ask for help (and hire people that are smarter than you)
  • Don’t forget about leadership

9. Do you have any positions currently open for pharmacists?

• Currently offer an internship program
• Also have an entry level medical writing position open
• Email: info@JBAshtin.com or visit www.JBAshtin.com

10. Any last words of wisdom?

• Even if you’ve become a little disenchanted with school/pharmacy, keep going at it
• Pharmacy is an amazing career
• You can do so many different things with this profession
• You have the ability to hop to new roles

Thank you Joni for sharing your story! Feel free to reach out to us at www.thenontraditionalpharmacist.com or on JB Ashtin’s website at www.JBAshtin.com.