Anyone thinking about switching careers will naturally consider the salary they may earn from the start to end of their journey.
I get asked this question a lot from aspiring medical writers or those considering medical writing as a flexible career option to fit around their lives. But they also wonder what they can earn as a professional medical writer and how it compares with their current career trajectory.
In this guest post Rina Vekaria Passmore, a self-employed, Principal Medical Writer, explores global salary information for medical writers, in a bid to answer the question:
What do medical writers earn?
Here’s what Rina has to say about her research:
Where to look for salary information?
Before the advent of the internet, it was difficult to find the salaries in different fields. And many people are still pretty reluctant to broach the subject of money, particularly in countries like the UK, where salaries are not comfortably discussed, not even in job interviews!
When I first started investigating alternative careers to academia, I ended up having to enrol in a careers fair where I attended lectures for each of my potential career options. Of course, nowadays, all the information you need is only a click away, although specific information can still be difficult to pin down because the remuneration varies across companies, countries/locations, and type/length of experience.
If you’re considering a career in medical writing, as a starting point, you can look up information available on websites such as Glassdoor and Indeed. It’s also a good idea to talk to medical writers in different companies in your country and to industry-relevant recruiters.
Understanding medical writing job titles
When looking for medical writing positions, you’ll need to get familiar with the job titles used for first-time vs established writers. And for the different types of medical writing careers.
For example, medical communications (MedComms) medical writers are called Associate Medical Writers at the entry level and then progress upwards as Junior, Senior and Principal Medical Writers in most MedComms agencies.
Pharma companies tend to use different titles for MedComms writers for example, Scientific Writer I-II, Senior Scientific Writer, and Expert Scientific Writer.
In the US, the labels Medical Writer I-III are used for regulatory writers. And in pharma, regulatory writers are referred to as Medical Writers compared with the Scientific Writer job titles typically used for MedComms writers.
Once you’re familiar with this terminology, it’s easier to compare salaries between anaologous roles and geographies.
Medical writing salary information in Europe
The results of a 2017 salary survey of European Medical Writers Association (EMWA) members are freely available:
Although the survey was completed by world-wide EMWA members, the majority of responses were from Europe and the salaries are reported in Euros.
The survey results indicated that the income of employed medical writers depended on many factors, including location, type of company, amount of work experience, and training received as a medical writer.
Here’s a snapshot of the 2017 salary ranges reported by EMWA survey respondents:
Source: Dressler et al. Results of the 2017 EMWA salary survey. Medical Writing. 2018:27 (1):43–50.
Of note, the ranges are very wide, possibly because the lower ends may have been for interns. The higher ends are likely due to salaries being more generous in countries with high tax rates or a scarcity of writers.
The starting salary may not be as high as you would like or expect, but remember to consider what you may earn within a few years — it doesn’t take talented Medical Writers long to reach Senior Scientific/Medical Writer level (2-3 years in many cases for writers with doctoral training).
I was also lucky enough to find a survey by UK recruiters that reported these ranges for salaried medical writers.
Source: WE3 Consulting. MedComms Salary Survey. Accessed May 2022.
The UK medical writing market is agency rich. In my experience, these companies tend to pay less (on average) than pharma companies. And the lower end of the Senior and Principal writer ranges seems a little low in my opinion in both Euros and GBP.
A Senior medical writer with several years of experience would typically be earning in excess of £45,000 in today’s market and up to £65,000, where market demand for trained medical writers has seen a boost in salaries since the pandemic began.
Freelance, self-employed writers typically earn 15-30% more on top of a salaried writer’s earnings, once they can attract regular work from high-paying clients.
Medical writing salary information outside of Europe
A Glassdoor search of typical salaries in two of the largest medical writing job markets outside of Europe, the US and India, shows similarly large salary ranges as found in the EMWA survey discussed above. With Glassdoor it’s possible to see the average pay in different companies. Searches in the US and India came up with these ranges of salaries:
Source: https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/index.htm. Accessed September 2022
On the whole US salaries are higher than European ones, with most US-based medical writers enjoying salaries in excess of 6 figures.
Salaries for medical writers in India are comfortably higher than those typically earned by most workers in India (average yearly salary of ₹383K per salaryexplorer).
Overall, with a few years of training, medical writing offers highly competitive salaries coupled with a flexibility that’s difficult to find in other pharma careers.
Hope this helps anyone who’s thinking about medical writing as a career.
One More thing: If medical writing sounds like an interesting career option and you would like to know more about medical writing before taking the leap, or are struggling to break in due to a lack of writing experience, here’s something to help you…
We (Vicky, Rina, and Vera Bin San Chan) have been hard at work developing a training programme for aspiring medical writers to break into MedComms.
The course will provide the functional writing skills needed to pass medical writing tests, present yourself as a credible candidate during the hiring process, and hit the ground running in your first MedComms writing role.
If this sounds of interest, you can learn more and register for the Become a Medical Writer (Medical Communications) training program here.