Free Book Excerpts

The Accidental Medical Writer tells you about our indirect paths to freelance medical writing and shares the many mistakes, lessons, and valuable tips we learned along the way.

Excerpt

Introduction

We both started out unqualified to do what we do today for a
living. We came to the same career from very different
experiences, educations, expectations, and needs. Today,
we are both successful freelance medical writers.

Cyndy was a health care professional who never planned on becoming
a writer. Brian was a writer who never planned on entering the health
care profession. Cyndy grew up at the end of an era where women were
relegated to certain roles and career choices and rarely switched boats
in midstream. Brian grew up at the end of the same era, when a man
was expected to get a good job and stick with it until retirement.

We wrote this book for everyone who is frustrated with working for
someone else. For everyone who wants the freedom and security that
freelance medical writing can help them achieve. We wrote this book to
tell you how we became successful, so you can gain the confidence and
skills to become successful, too.

In our journeys to becoming successful freelance medical writers, we
made different mistakes and learned different lessons. The tips we have
to share with you can help you avoid some of the pitfalls and perhaps
get to the benefits that freelance medical writing has to offer a bit faster.

We have worked together as colleagues for a long time, and we are
committed to sharing what we know with other professionals who are
interested in pursuing freelance medical writing as a career. Over the
years, we found that giving seminars at local and national meetings was
one way to reach aspiring freelance medical writers, but it never felt like
quite enough. That’s why we wrote this book, launched a website, and
made a commitment to publish an entire series of books to help you
achieve your personal and professional goals.

When we started out, we often found ourselves flying by the seats of our
pants. We did things intuitively because 20 years ago there wasn’t a lot
of information out there about how to become a medical writer, let alone
how to become a freelance medical writer. As you will find when you
read our stories, it wasn’t always easy.

It is our hope that by reading about our unqualifications and our quests
for success, you will be inspired and armed to take a risk and pursue
something for which you, too, might feel that you are currently
unqualified. That doesn’t mean that anyone can become a successful
freelance medical writer. You can’t go from plumbing, for example, to
medical writing, without some type of commensurate experience, either
in science, writing, health care, or a similar area of expertise. Medical
writing requires a distinct set of skills, which you will be able to discern
as you read this book and others in our series. A medical or science
background helps, but isn’t essential. Likewise, a writing background
can provide an advantage, but isn’t mandatory.

Is this book just for people who want to become successful freelance
medical writers? No. The strategies, lessons, and tips that we provide
can be applied to any freelance endeavor. We achieved our success
through medical writing, but our tips and techniques can be applied to
other types of writing as well as to other types of freelance businesses.

Is this book just for people who are in the same circumstances in which
we found ourselves at the time we first became freelance medical
writers? No again. Freelance medical writing is a perfect career choice
whether you’re returning to the workforce or planning your exit, plotting
a career change, or releasing your inner muse.

This book will give you the confidence you need to get started and the
foundation you need to become successful. The other books in our
series will teach you how to do what we do, so you can overcome your
personal unqualifications and become a successful freelance medical
writer, too.

Will this book make you a successful freelance writer by itself? No. But
with its tips, strategies, and lessons, it holds the potential to give you a
foundation on which to build your own success, however you define that
for yourself. You ultimately are the one who determines your success.
You’ll decide which messages in this book to take to heart and which to
discard. Your success lies within you.

Are you ready to take the next step?

Section 1:
Cyndy’s Story

THE ACCIDENTAL MEDICAL WRITER

My Unqualifications

I had my initial clue that my career wasn’t going to mesh well with my
lifestyle as a parent when my female boss called me 4 hours after I
delivered our first child and requested a teleconference to discuss
certain work-related issues that just couldn’t wait. I had gone into labor
around midnight, delivered our daughter at 5:45 that Monday morning,
and by 9 a.m. all I wanted to do was breathe in the beauty of my
newborn and possibly take a well-deserved nap. In the euphoric haze
that accompanies childbirth, there was no way I could lead a conference
call and sound intelligent on the phone.

At that point in my life my official job title was Clinical Director at a
suburban Philadelphia rehabilitation hospital. In that capacity, I
managed a residential-living program that retrained adults with traumatic
brain injury and taught them how to live independently. I directed staff,
managed budgets, soothed the frayed nerves of patients and their
families, and was the person responsible when something went wrong.
And if you know anything about health care, you know that things
always go wrong.

Still, I enjoyed my job and was perfectly willing to put in the extra hours
necessary to get everything done. My salary was adequate (not great),
benefits were good (OK, looking back, those were definitely great), and,
having been recently promoted, I felt as though I was climbing the
corporate health care ladder. With a master’s degree in
speech/language pathology from Bloomsburg State College (now
Bloomsburg University) in Pennsylvania, plus 12 years of experience
working as a speech pathologist under my belt, moving into an
administrative position was exactly what I wanted to do.

As one of those women who came of age during women’s liberation, I
had always assumed that I could have it all, and have it all at the same
time. But I never considered myself to be driven. I worked hard to
maintain a balance between work and play and enjoyed satisfying
activities outside of work: gardening, sewing, and reading, to name a
few. Being bulldozed by an aggressive boss who placed work before
family was never part of the plan.

The morning I became a parent I kindly declined to participate in the
conference call and took that nap instead, but I spent the next 2 years
juggling my professional work and my personal life. Parenting was
tougher and more enjoyable than I had ever imagined. With the birth of
our second child, and a paycheck that was dwindling as more dollars
went to pay for day care, I knew I needed to do something else.

With an infant on my lap and a toddler dancing around the kitchen, I
called my neighbor, a 50-something successful medical writer, and
asked the question that opened the door to my career in freelance
medical writing: “Tell me how I can write stuff and get paid for it.”

**********************************************************

Why have I told you all of this? Well, I’m certainly not trying to reinforce
the assumption that it’s not what you know but who you know, although
having a mentor to nurture you along the way is something I would
recommend (you’ll read more about that later). Nor is this meant to be
an endorsement of working motherhood.

What I’m trying to demonstrate here and my colleague, Brian, is trying
to convey as well is the circuitous paths we took to medical writing.
And if we could do it, so can you.

When I graduated from college with an advanced degree in speech
pathology, I didn’t even know what a medical writer was. Today I’m the
sole proprietor of a successful freelance medical writing business who’s
produced materials for some of the major pharmaceutical players:
Abbott, Wyeth, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Johnson & Johnson, Novartis, and
Pfizer. I’ve been a medical writer for more than 16 years now, and I
don’t see an end in sight, although God may have other plans.

Convincing folks that a speech pathologist could become a writer (and
a good one at that) was a challenge. Even my husband, Kim, scoffed
when I told him I was going to earn a living as a freelance medical writer.
“A writer?” he asked. “What kind of experience do YOU have as a
writer?”

Good point.

I’d like to tell you that the whole business of, well, developing a business
was easy, but I won’t lie to you. Work and money didn’t just flow
automatically once I hung out my freelance shingle. There were some
years when my receivables were well under the poverty level and others
when I billed out enough to feel confident about paying 2 college tuitions
in the future. One year, days stretched into weeks that stretched into
months without a paying job coming across my desk. It was tough and
disheartening, and I began to panic. I knew what my husband was
thinking, even though it was unspoken: “At least do something to bring
in some bucks, because my salary isn’t enough to support all of our
needs.” But I never gave up, despite the bumps and bruises I
encountered along the way. And I know you can benefit from my
experience.

You’re obviously interested in learning more about how to become a
medical writer or you wouldn’t have bothered to buy this book. So let me
warn you up front. In these pages you won’t find a step-by-step plan that
you should follow exactly to become a successful freelance medical
writer. Instead, you’ll read about how Brian and I developed careers in a
field where some of our potential clients (and former colleagues from our
previous professional lives) considered us unqualified. We’ll tell you the
things we did right, but, more importantly, we’ll explain where we went
wrong; you’ll have the benefit of hindsight. Along the way, you’ll find
practical advice that you can use to make changes in your own life.

As you read this book, you’ll see that Brian and I took quite different
paths, but ended up in similar places. He had more experience in writing,
advertising, and marketing; I had more experience in health care and a
background as a clinician. Both of us had the entrepreneurial drive to
work independently and create our own businesses. Neither of us is a
doctor or a nurse or an English major. For better or worse, our strengths
and weaknesses dictated the choices we made when we took the leap
into freelance medical writing.

The fact that the wage I earned was secondary income for my family
also played a major role in the business decisions I made (or avoided,
for that matter). With a husband who worked full time and brought home
the benefits, I had the luxury to grow my business more slowly than did
Brian. And being a female affected the approach I took to my freelance
career. Yes, as much as I hate to admit this even though it’s true,
gender does make a difference, as you’ll see when you compare Brian’s
story with mine.

If freelance medical writing is something you’re considering, but you
don’t feel qualified, don’t be discouraged. You can make it big in the
business of freelance medical writing without experience. I know. I did it.
So did my coauthor. And so can you.

Read more about The Accidental Medical Writer and Cyndy Kryder and Brian Bass HERE.

Copyright 2008 Cyndy Kryder and Brian Bass. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author.