CHAPTER OFFICERS 2009

Forrest Blocker, PhD President

Forrest got her Bachelor's degree from UCSD in Physics and her PhD from UCSF in Biophysics where her research focused on structure elucidation of nucleic acids using NMR and molecular modeling. She continued her postdoctoral education at The Scripps Research Institute studying protein structure and millisecond dynamic processes. She then joined the faculty of the University of Texas at Austin, where she focused on intron protein/RNA interactions and mechanisms.

She now consults and writes on competitive intelligence and market research in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, with a particular interest in autoimmune diseases.  Her writing includes both non-regulatory articles and journals and document preparation for regulatory submissions. More information about her regulatory writing is available at her website pharmstatus.com. She has also developed, edited, and published a line of interactive textbooks regularly used as the primary textbook for eight courses at Ohio University and Kent State University.

Other organizations in which Forrest participates are the Bio2E2, BioScience Forum, and Drug Information Association.

Elizabeth Matovinovic - Immediate Past President

Elizabeth Matovinovic has been an AMWA member and a medical writer for 4 years. She obtained a Bachelor's degree in English Literature and a Master of Science in Molecular Embryology, both in Canada. As a scientist, Elizabeth has done research in several biomedical fields including respiratory illnesses, environmental epidemiology, and cardiovascular disease. A career in medical writing satisfies her broad scientific interests and fulfills her need for subject matter freshness.

In addition to medical writing, Elizabeth is active in publications planning and pharmaceutical industry related transparency issues regarding manuscript preparation and authorship. In the future, when old and wise, Elizabeth may publish some creative writing.

Here's the new-news: Elizabeth has left us to pursue her PhD research in Australia, and we are most grateful for her service. Forrest Blocker, our former vice president, has taken over Elizabeth's duties.

Sunny Bishop - Treasurer

In my 30+ years of science, medical, and technical writing and editing, I have experience with academic, post-market pharmaceutical, and clinical research; hi-tech and science education in the private industry sector; and a governmental health insurance program. I have additional experience as a bookkeeper/controller for some small retail shops. Full details of my background and experience are available on my Web site.

I have an undergraduate degree in Microbiology and a Master's degree from UC Davis in Endocrinology. I joined AMWA in 1983 and have been a member for most of the time since then. I have been on the Board of the Northern California Chapter serving as Treasurer since 2004. I passed the BELS exam in 2005.

Words that inspire:
Do unto others what you would have them do unto you.
--The Golden Rule

Joan Brodovsky - Secretary

Joan Brodovsky's interest in medical writing led to posts in both an industrial and a medical dot com as writer and editor in the early 2000s.She was an independent consultant in Mexico City for the chemical and pharmaceutical industries for many years, specializing in market research for pharmaceutical and chemical firms. She returned to the United States to take a position as consultant at Frost and Sullivan, a market research and strategy management consulting firm, where she has become the ad hoc editor for the Healthcare and Life Science Consulting Group.

Joan has an undergraduate degree in Chemistry from the University of California at Berkeley and an MS in Physiology from Stanford University. Her curriculum includes work in the quality control laboratory of a pharmaceutical laboratory; an appointment as Associate Professor at the Universidad Iberoamericana, where she taught Chemistry; and a position as Director for Services to the Pharmaceutical Industry at the Mexican National Science and Technology Council.

She qualified for certification as Editor in the Life Sciences in 2004. She is fluent in Spanish, conversant in German, and readsFrench, Italian, and Portuguese. She has been an active member of the American Medical Writers Association, the American Chemical Society, the Mexican Pharmaceutical Association.

Catherine Magill, PhD - Programs Chair

Catherine Magill has worked as a freelance scientific/medical writer and editor for four years after more than 11 years in cell biology/pharmacology research in Bay Area biotech companies (one job, four companies). The desire for more flexibility in her work-life drove her to look into freelance opportunities in writing/editing for biotech, and during the course of that research she found AMWA and has been active in the Northern California Chapter since 2005. She recently completed the requirements for an AMWA certificate in Editing/Writing and is working on the Freelance one, and served this past year as President and the previous year as Vice-President and Acting Program Chair.

Catherine got her Bachelor's degree from UC Berkeley in Neurobiology and her PhD from Stanford in Neurosciences and then moved to Harvard to do post-doctoral training in Molecular Embryology. She quickly determined that she prefers Northern California life and after three years she returned to the Bay Area to work in biotech, where she focused predominantly on drug discovery in the areas of oncology and inflammation.

Other professional organizations in which Catherine participates are the Northern California Science Writer's Association, American Association of Cancer Research, Association for Women in Science, and American Society for Cell Biology.

Fred Gebhart - Newsletter Editor

Fred Gebhart has been a freelancer for two decades, starting in pharmaceuticals and expanding into oncology, cardiology, and other speciality areas. He stumbled across AMWA while working the daily newspaper at a medical convention several years ago. This is Fred's first foray into chapter activities.

He graduated from UC Santa Barbara and learned the quick and dirty basics of health care as a Peace Corps volunteer in Senegal. Fred is also a member of the International Society of Travel Medicine, the National Association of Science Writers, and the American Society of Journalists and Authors.

Monique La Fleur, PhD - Membership Liaison

Monique La Fleur has been an AMWA member for 3 years. She received her Ph.D. from Laval University (Quebec, Canada) in Molecular Biology/Immunology, and pursued her postdoctoral studies on nerve regeneration and metalloproteinases at UC San Francisco. After completing her studies, Monique entered the biotech workforce in 1996. She has worked on various research projects ranging from retinal degeneration to cancer.

She enjoys writing and would like to hone her medical writing skills. Monique feels that being a member of Northern California AMWA is the first step in the right direction.

Kristen Mayo, PhD (Asilomar) Conference Director

Kristen Mayo has worked as a medical writer in the pharmaceutical industry for 10 years, in 4 companies in the San Francisco Bay Area.Prior to that, she was a technical writer/editor in a biotech company for 6 years. Kristen has been an active member of AMWA since 1998 and she completed the AMWA requirements for a Multidisciplinary certificate in 2002. Kristen has volunteered to serve as the 2010 Conference Director for the Northern California Chapter as a way to give back to AMWA. She looks forward to working with a core group of friends and colleagues to help make Asilomar 2010 as fun, rewarding, and memorable as we have come to expect from this time-honored tradition.

Kristen received her Bachelor's degree from UC Santa Barbara (with a double major in English and Anthropology) and a PhD in Biology from UCSB. She went on to do postdoctoral research in biochemistry/molecular biology at Stanford Medical Center, and then was a guest researcher at the Karolinska Medical Research Institute in Stockholm, Sweden. It was while living in Europe and on maternity leave that Kristen began her career as science writer and editor. When she re-entered the workforce in the US in 1992, she was able to make the switch completely from lab research to technical writing. The transition to medical writing happened in 1998, with the help of a friend and mentor (an AMWA member). Kristen's medical writing experience thus far has focused primarily in the therapeutic areas of cancer prevention, autoimmune diseases, and pain control.

Non-elected positions

Catherine Magill - Past-President

See above.

Mimi Wessling PhD- Web Site Administrator

Mimi Wessling is a relative newcomer to the field, having spent most of her professional life as an academic. She has been a technical and medical writer for 10 years, and a member of AMWA-Northern California for 4 years. She received graduate degrees from the University of Pennsylvania (Physical Chemistry) and the University of Michigan (History of Science and Medicine). Her previous career in academia included positions at University of Michigan, Stanford University, and the University of Essex (U.K.)

Her professional interests are medical communication, medical ethics, translations of medical and scientific writing from German, scientific writing, and regulatory writing. If scrolling this far down hasn't exhausted you, take a look at her Web site, Language Matters Santa Cruz. There you'll find a link to the preface of her recently published translation of a classic in the history of medical ethics.