Mathematical and Statistical Skills in the Biopharmaceutical Industry

Book excerpt: Mathematical and Statistical Skills in the Biopharmaceutical Industry: A Pragmatic Approach describes a philosophy of efficient problem solving showcased using examples pertinent to the biostatistics function in clinical drug development. It was written to share a quintessence of the authors’ experiences acquired during many years of relevant work in the biopharmaceutical industry. The book will be useful will be useful for biopharmaceutical industry statisticians at different seniority levels and for graduate students who consider a biostatistics-related career in this industry. Features: Describes a system of principles for pragmatic problem solving in clinical drug development. Discusses differences in the work of a biostatistician in small pharma and big pharma. Explains the importance/relevance of statistical programming and data management for biostatistics and necessity for integration on various levels. Describes some useful statistical background that can be capitalized upon in the drug development enterprise. Explains some hot topics and current trends in biostatistics in simple, non-technical terms. Discusses incompleteness of any system of standard operating procedures, rules and regulations. Provides a classification of scoring systems and proposes a novel approach for evaluation of the safety outcome for a completed randomized clinical trial. Presents applications of the problem solving philosophy in a highly problematic transfusion field where many investigational compounds have failed. Discusses realistic planning of open-ended projects.