Be open to other options than what you have in your mind!

Michiel Hartog aimed for a research project in a real, ‘wet’ laboratory, but is after all very happy with the literature review that he is doing. “I have a lot of freedom to shape the study myself, but I am very well supervised as well because the topic is rather abstract.” His advice: start looking for a project as early on as possible, monitor KonJoin well and be open to other options than what you have in your mind!

Michiel obtained his bachelor’s degree in Pharmaceutical Sciences and was interested in doing research into the development of new medication. But such projects were not on offer at the time and also his many open applications were not succesful. What he did find on Konjoin was a project concerning ‘non-randomized’ drug efficacy studies. Such studies are based on the effectiveness of medicines in real life.

Because of the real life conditions, the interpretation of such studies is less straightforward as compared to clinical trials. From a literature study, Michiel identified over 280 guidelines that were used. Now his aim is finding the best combination of tools for assessing the effectiveness of drugs in real life.

The importance of this kind of research is considerate. Randomized drug efficacy studies are often used by policy makers to decide which medicines obtain the label ‘preferred’ and thus are reimbursed by the insurance company. Hence Michiel’s results may have an impact on the reimbursement policies of insurers.