Clinical Data

Andreas Beust

How a Small CRO Covers the Globe Without Growing

Andreas Beust — CEO and Managing Director of GCP Service International in Bremen and President of ACROS, the Association of International CROs — joins Adam Walker to explain how a small CRO can run trials globally without ballooning in size. Ten similarly sized, like-minded CROs across the US, Europe, the Middle East, India, China and Australia agree that once a partner joins, their country is off-limits to the others: grow together, not bigger. Also in this episode: from the biostatistics desk to the CEO's office, hiring for attitude, leading without ego, a frank reality check on AI in clinical trials, and why discomfort is what actually drives growth.

Clinical Trials

Graham Allcott

Kind, Psychological Safety & the Quiet Power of Kindness at Work

Graham Allcott — bestselling author of How to Be a Productivity Ninja and Kind: The Quiet Power of Kindness at Work — joins Adam Walker to dismantle the ruthless-boss archetype. Kindness builds trust, trust builds psychological safety, and psychologically safe teams outperform everyone else. Along the way: Timpson and family businesses, why charities aren't always the kindest places to work, the kindness window that closes as you notice it, slowness as savouring, and how Seth Godin came to blurb the book.

Leadership & Career

Adam Walker

GMP, Sepsis & 900k NHS Doses a Year

Host Adam Walker meets his namesake — Qualified Person, NHS pharmacist and Head of Development & Innovation at the North East and North Cumbria Medicines Manufacturing Centre. They cover Specials manufacturing, the new aseptic pathfinder hub gearing up for 150,000 chemotherapy and 750,000 IV antibiotic doses a year, the door-to-needle sepsis window, the personal loss driving the mission, and the Help Me GMP platform training the next generation.

Healthcare Systems

Lisa Kerr

Patient Engagement, Lived Experience & Why 95% of Eligible Patients Never Join a Trial

Lisa Kerr — Head of Patient Engagement at Evinova, AstraZeneca's health tech business — joins Adam Walker for one of the most honest conversations on the Pharma Prescribed Podcast. A PhD chemist who climbed to global project director, hit the cliff edge, and came back with a mission: divorce, clinical depression, three months as an outpatient at the Priory, founding AstraZeneca's Safe Space ERG, building mental health navigation tools that scaled globally — and why only 5–7% of eligible patients ever join a clinical trial.

Mental Health & Wellbeing

Alen Hadzic

Clinical Trial Scan, Dyno AI & Engineering Patient Enrollment

Alen Hadzic — founder and CEO of Clinical Trial Scan and creator of Dyno AI — joins Adam Walker for a masterclass in patient recruitment as an engineered system. Former Olympic fencer, ex-affiliate advertiser with $5–7M of clinical trial ad data behind him, Alen breaks down his seven-step enrollment funnel, why hot leads beat cold databases, how his Medellín call team converts in the evening blocks the industry sleeps through, and the patent-pending cost-per-enrollment model behind it all.

Clinical Trials

Dr Pat Boulogne

Functional Medicine, Fasting Since 17 on Zero Medications @71

Dr Pat Boulogne — performance optimisation strategist, functional medicine expert and bestselling author — joins Adam Walker for one of the most practical wellbeing conversations on Pharma Prescribed. At 71, on zero medications, Pat shares 30+ years of root-cause medicine: intermittent fasting since age 17, food pairing and the alkaline tide, the three brains, affirmations with a why, dairy and microbiome, and the organic broccoli story.

Mental Health & Wellbeing

Andy York

AI, Data Science & Why 80% Accuracy Isn't Good Enough

Today's guest is Andy York, one of the most respected voices in global statistical programming and clinical data science. Andy shares 30+ years of lessons — from paper CRFs to AI guardrails, the shift from SAS to R, and what the next generation of pharma programmers must learn to stay relevant.

AI & Technology

Dermot Whelan

Burnout, Anxiety & the Science of Mindfulness

Broadcaster, comedian, best-selling author and meditation teacher Dermot Whelan joins Adam Walker to talk about reframing stress, navigating anxiety and panic attacks, escaping the busyness badge of honour, and the simple tools — from box breathing to checking in with your heart — that turn the stress response into a superpower.

Mental Health & Wellbeing

Adam Baumgart

RBQM, AI in Clinical Trials & 38 Years of Hard-Won Pharma Wisdom

Today's guest is Adam Baumgart, an advisor and consultant at ZS Associates and Alcedo Consulting whose passion is enhancing risk-based quality management and clinical trial processes. Drawing on 35 years of CRO and pharma experience, including leadership roles at AstraZeneca and Covance, Adam provides strategic input on AI models to optimize RBQM, clinical data review, and site monitoring.

Clinical Trials

Scott Schliebner

DCTs, Patient-Centric Trials & 30 Years of Pharma Innovation

Today's guest is Scott Schliebner, who is a seasoned biopharma executive with nearly 30 years of experience spanning biotech, CROs and nonprofit life science organizations. He currently serves as CEO and founder of Ascent Biostrategies and previously has worked at Novatech and various other companies.

AI & Technology

Amelia Wrighton

Suicide Loss, Grief & the Charity That Helped Adam's Family

Today's guest is Amelia Wrighton, who is the co-founder and CEO of the charity, suicide and Co. Her commitment to suicide bereavement is rooted in her lived experience and is a powerful thread running through her work and her leadership.

Mental Health & Wellbeing

Sylvain Berthelot

Patient-Centricity, Korean Innovation & Simplifying Trials

Today's guest is Sylvain Berthelot, who is a clinical technology and life science professional with deep expertise in clinical systems and the digital ecosystem that supports modern clinical research.

Clinical Trials

Duncan Kemp

Redundancy, Reinvention & 20 Years of Clinical Software

Today's guest is Duncan Kemp, who is the founder of Software Solutions, a software consultancy firm with a mission to empower life science businesses with innovative and reliable solutions that drive efficiency, enhanced productivity, and foster growth.

Founders & MedTech

Poorya Amini

Protocol AI, 800k Clinical Trials & Why Pharma Does It Wrong

Today's guest is Poorya Amini, founder and CEO of Risklick A Swiss digital health company that's redefining how clinical trial protocols are designed Poorya's, journey spans veterinary medicine, a PhD in pharmacology. And hands-on experience managing trials at the University of Burn.

AI & Technology

Wendy Turenne

Real World Evidence, Messy Data & Why AI Must Earn Your Trust

Today's guest is Wendy Turenne, widely known in the industry as Real World Wendy. A strategic force in real world data and evidence generation, she most recently served as Chief Data Officer and SVP of Evidence Solutions at Aeon, where she led global teams in transforming real world data into regulatory-grade evidence.

Clinical Trials

Jan Krikava

Docuply, Affordable QMS & Why Small Pharma Deserves Better Tools

Today's guest is Jan Krikava, co-founder and managing director of Docu Ply, a document automation platform purpose built for the pharmaceutical and healthcare sectors with a degree in software engineering and a background in enterprise.

Clinical Trials

Artem Adrianov

RBQM, Fraud Detection & Young CEO Program Outperforming MBAs

Today's guest is Artem Adrianov, mathematician strategist, Risk-Based Quality Management, trailblazer as co-founder and CEO of Integrity. He spent over 25 years transforming clinical trials through data intelligence and risk-based methodologies.

Clinical Trials

Dr. Anna Titkova

Building Clinical Trials in Ukraine War, COVID & Restarting

Today's guest is Anna Titkova, who is the International Operations Director and Country head of Pratia Ukraine, one of Europe's largest site networks, where she oversees operations across multiple countries with a focus on accessibility, innovation, and quality.

Clinical Trials

Yuriy Lebid

Building a CRO in Ukraine, Wartime Resilience & Never Giving Up

Yuriy Lebid — CEO of Ukrainian CRO Pharmaxi — joins Adam Walker to tell the story of leading a clinical research company through the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. From evacuating Kyiv on 24 February 2022 to promising salaries in full for six months, restarting trials with better enrollment than before the war, expanding into Poland, and rebuilding for growth, Yuriy shares hard-won lessons on resilience, honesty in hiring, and why passion — not calculation — is the only durable foundation for a career.

Leadership & Career