Erin McCrone

"I am a 24 year-old female from Scotland and I hope that with what this campaign does, it encourages young girls to become involved and do what they enjoy without fear or bias. "

"I am a Clinical Research Associate (CRA) for PPD, part of Thermo Fisher. We are a Clinical Research Organisation, who work with Sponsors (drug developers) and Sites (hospitals and research centres where patients go for Clinical Trials). My role involves being assigned to Clinical Research Studies taking place in the UK, and travelling to different sites in order to verify source data for patients. Whilst on site, it's my job to verify that all of the data that sites have documented is correct and per the study (and Good Clinical Practice GCP) requirements/standards. If there are any discrepancies, then these need to be actioned. In my role, we also initiate and close sites at the beginning and end of studies. During the beginning, this involves a visit to the new site where we train the site staff on the new study protocol and go over all of the study requirements with the staff.When not on site, I spend most time writing up visit reports. These are vital in documenting what happened on site, any findings that were found, queries raised or closed etc. When not writing reports, I am following up on emails to collect study documents from sites, or performing remote training calls with sites. The local team alongside myself all play important roles in closing findings and queries, and helping answer site's questions about the studies. I really enjoy being involved in the clinical studies, I enjoy learning about new studies and the diseases/new potential treatments. It's nice to know that the work you are involved in makes such a difference in people's lives, and that the drugs from studies you are working on could one day be marketed and used as standard treatments for people."

"During my time at university (doing a BSc Hons in applied Psychology) I worked part-time as a store assistant in a retail store. I then progressed to Store Supervisor during this time, which gave me great experience with the public and in team-leading. I worked here for a total of 5 years, from age 17 to 22 and this really built up my confidence in both myself, and with my ability to work with others. I graduated with my BSc just before I turned 22, and spent a few months job-hunting (with many rejections) I landed on an advert for a job within my current company. It was for a completely different department and area than I currently work, but it sounded interesting (it was within drug-safety analysis department). Unfortunately, I was unsuccessful with this application, but 2 months after this, I was contacted by a recruiter for the company asking if I would be interested in a trial/pilot role as a Clinical Operations Assistant. This would be helping study teams at a Central Level (Globally) with administrative and technical tasks. After a telephone and a video interview, I was offered this role and accepted.3 months after starting, I was informed we would be transitioning to local roles within the same department - and this is when I joined the UKs Regional Operational Delivery Team in Clinical Operations. I started as a Clinical Trial Coordinator, and then I applied and landed the Assistant Clinical Research Associate role 1 year later. 7 months after this, I was promoted to my current role Clinical Research Associate, where I have been for 4 months now. Starting off not knowing much about the world of clinical research, it has been very interesting learning all about it and being able to work my way up through the career ladder to where I am now."

"In my spare time I enjoy spending time with friends/family. I love going out to try new foods/restaurants, as well as any new dessert shops! I also enjoy going to the gym and trying to remain active; which is needed as my other favourite pass-time is cosy nights in watching horror films with snacks. I do a lot of driving for work, so podcasts and audiobooks have become a new staple in what I enjoy. I have also started to get back into reading books more, so this is slowly taking up more of my time.I'm a big animal lover and I really enjoy going to conservational zoos and farm parks as much as I can. "

"My typical day consists usually of writing monitoring visit reports, performing remote monitoring, and checking/replying to emails from sites with queries. Very regularly, I also travel to sites/hospitals around the UK where clinical trials are taking place to perform my monitoring visits. This entails spending the day at the hospital verifying all of the source data for patients participating in the clinical trials. After visits, there tends to be findings which need to be followed up on, and this is where I work with the local team to try and work out how we can close these findings and help the sites with their queries. "

"I have a BSc Honours in Applied Psychology. I also have 7 Scottish SQA Highers (English, Maths, Physics, History, Georgraphy, Modern Studies, and Graphic Communications)After graduating university, I came across a posting for a job within my company, but a different department that I had applied for (did not get the job) but a recruiter contacted me 3 months later to ask whether I would be interested in interviewing for a trial/pilot role within the company - I went on to get this job before transitioning into further roles within my time at PPD, Part of Thermo Fisher. "