Even though many of our graduates will have progressed in their careers since completing a case study, they are still of interest to students who wish to gain an understanding of the world of work.

Protocol development
Grant writing
Database development
Research coordination
Manuscript preparation
Data analysis

I assist researchers with their research projects by carrying out any of the tasks listed above. On any given day I could be working on a variety of different research projects within the scope of women's health research. For example, yesterday I prepared a data access request to gain access to data from a perinatal database. Once we get that data, we will be able to do some data analysis to determine whether water births are as safe as traditional land births. Today, I am beginning to draft a manuscript about women's attitudes towards medical abortions. Next week, I need to develop a database using REDCap to allow us to analyse data to reduce patient wait times for one of the programs within the BC Women's Hospital. Next week I am also travelling to Kelowna to introduce a new project to the hospital there and provide an orientation session.

I get to conduct all parts of clinical research but for a wide variety of clinical problems. I also get to conduct lots of different and challenging tasks depending on the research projects, so each day is never the same. I love helping with important research that changes clinical policy and ultimately improves the health of women.

I need to have a diverse range of skills from being able to manipulate and analyse data to being able to write a manuscript.

I want to work on research that will ultimately change policy and improve the health of women.

I developed a lot of transferable skills in my MSc at Sheffield that I use in my daily work life. My MSc integrated maths and programming with biology. There are not that many people who do health research who can also do data analysis (and enjoy it!) so my skill set is very desirable.

Jan - May 2013 - Clinical Trials Assistant, Richmond Pharmacology, London
Jun 2013 - Jun 2014 - Assistant Program Manager, National Institute for Health Research, London
Jul 2014 - Jul 2015 - Research Assistant, Imperial College London
Aug 2015 - Oct 2015 - Moved to Canada
Oct 2015 - Feb 2016 - Clinical Research Coordinator, Vancouver BC
Feb - Mar 2016 - Broke my arm (too much snow & ice in Canada)!!
Mar 2016 - Feb 2017 - Research Assistant, Women's Health Research Institute, Vancouver BC
Feb 2017 - Present - Research Analyst, Women's Health Research Institute, Vancouver BC

I am planning to do a certification in population data analysis. I hope that after doing my current job for a while and getting the above certification that I may be able to move into the role of Epidemiologist one day.

Start from the bottom and work your way up. There are lots of Research Assistant positions about - some better than others - that you can often do as a new graduate.

Also, do something to make you stand out from everyone else. For example, when I was still doing my undergraduate degree, I spent a summer as an Intern at the National Center for Drug Screening in Shanghai, China.

Leo  Mathematics (MMath) (2014)
Operational Research Analyst  (Business, administration and public sector)

Accepts questions from students about their career