Health Careers on the Rise: Medical Science Liaisons at Cannabis Companies

“Medical science liaisons are vital to the success of a company even during these unprecedented times,” says Dr. Samuel Dyer, CEO and Chairman of the Board for the MSL Society. “According to a survey that included 475 KOLs across 21 specialties in the US, 61 percent of KOLs reported that even during the COVID-19 pandemic, their engagements with MSLs are very or somewhat valuable.”

The responsibilities of an MSL will vary based on therapeutic focus, geographical location, company type, and the current stage of a product’s life cycle. Typically, the responsibilities will be categorized into three areas: engaging external stakeholders, collaborating with internal stakeholders, and maintaining their own scientific expertise. Some of the most common tasks for MSLs are attending conferences, educating other healthcare professionals, delivering presentations, and training and supporting their company’s sales force.

Many companies use alternative titles, but the roles are generally equivalent in responsibility. Other titles for MSLs include medical liaisons, medical managers, regional scientific managers, clinical liaisons, and scientific affairs managers. While the educational standards have changed over the years for the MSL role, today it’s considered ideal to have a doctoral degree (either a PharmD or PhD).

“Today having a doctorate degree is the educational standard in the industry for the MSL role,” Dr. Dyer says. “In fact, according to the 2019 MSL Society Salary & Compensation Survey, which included 1,987 MSL professionals, 91 percent of newly hired MSLs in the US have a doctoral degree.”

The educational demands are high for MSLs, but so are the rewards: according to the 2019 MSL Salary & Compensation Survey conducted by the MSL Society, the average salary for an MSL based in the U.S. is over $167,000 per year. Also, a separate 2020 MSL Society global survey found that 68 percent of MSL managers plan to expand the size of their MSL departments.

This is a lucrative and fast-growing profession—and it has an integral role to play in adding value for a rising wave of new pharmaceutical companies.

The increase in MSLs is on course to collide with another trend: the boom of the cannabis industry. So far, 33 states have legalized medicinal cannabis, and ten of those have permitted recreational use. It’s been called the Green Rush, and with good reason: legal cannabis has added over 210,000 full-time jobs to the American economy. According to Leafly’s 2019 Cannabis Jobs Count, more than 64,000 of those jobs were added in 2018 alone.

Most cannabis-related jobs currently support the sale of recreational or medicinal cannabis, but the next wave of cannabis-related jobs could come from the more professional, and more lucrative, pharmaceutical industry. That’s where cannabinoid-derived drugs and treatments are being explored, developed, and tested at the highest standards.

Cannabis has been used in medical treatments for over 6,000 years, but research in the modern age has been stunted by the drug’s Schedule I status in the US. As cannabis has pushed further into the mainstream, however, pharmaceutical companies are intensifying their interest—and their abundant resources—in the sector. There are currently close to 400 active and completed clinical trials related to cannabidiol (CBD) across the world, with studies suggesting it can be used to treat epilepsy, schizophrenia, multiple sclerosis, migraines, arthritis, and the side effects of cancer.

But since cannabinoids are relative newcomers to the world of mainstream medicine, a tremendous amount of research and education still needs to take place. That’s where medical science liaisons come into the picture.

Consider Tetra Bio-Pharma, a global leader in cannabinoid-derived drug discovery and development. The company specializes in combining traditional methods of medicinal cannabis use with the supporting scientific validation and safety data required for the biopharma industry by regulators, physicians, and insurance companies. Bridging that gap requires medical science liaisons (MSLs).

“We’re planning to hire three MSLs soon, and they will report to me directly,” says Steeve Néron, Chief Operating Officer of Tetra Bio-Pharma. “The nature of the MSL position will be, first, to establish the role in advanced cancer pain for cannabis.”

Tetra Bio-Pharma has several treatments in development. CAUMZ, a synthetic, inhaled, cannabinoid pain relief drug, is about to enter phase three clinical trials. QIXLEEF, a botanical-based inhaled cannabinoid medicine, is about to enter phase two clinical trials. As Tetra continues its march towards FDA-approval, it has the chance to break into the global drug market for pain management, which Allied Market Research projects will reach $130 billion by 2023. MSLs will have a significant role to play in educating doctors on the benefits and proper usage of Tetra’s new forms of treatment.

“Basically, the MSLs will educate doctors on our new therapeutic options,” Néron says. “They’ll do that probably six months prior to the launch, making sure they understand from A to Z all the supporting evidence. In the case of CAUMZ and QIZLEEF, we’ll have a formal data pack made of preclinical, phase one, phase two, and eventually phase three results.”

Cannabis-related treatments still face stigma from some doctors and regulators. But as the opioid epidemic rages in the US, demand for less addictive alternatives is increasing. MSLs at Tetra and other cannabinoid-based pharmaceutical companies face the challenge of educating an at-times non-receptive audience. Their responsibilities and standards, however, will be the same as they would be at any other pharmaceutical company.

“I used to be MSL director at Merck in Canada,” Néron says. “Here, it will be exactly the same. We’re going to use the Big Pharma standard of performance. We’ll have proper pharmacovigilance in place.”

Tetra’s MSLs will have strong academic backgrounds: preferably a PhD with a background in the central nervous system (CNS). And when Tetra looks to sign a deal with any strategic partners in the US, they’ll require that the partner have MSLs in place who can answer tough, scientific, compliance-related questions with expertise and authority. MSLs are a sign of competence, maturity, and ethical practice within the industry.

At the moment, cannabis-based pharmaceutical companies like Tetra can’t afford to compensate MSLs to the same extent that behemoths like Merck and Pfizer can. But they can offer stock options, which, given the direction of the cannabis industry, could end up being extremely lucrative. Just how lucrative they turn out to be is at least partially in the hands of this next generation of medical science liaisons.