Megan Christy
MedTech Consulting Internship
@ S2N Health
Summer 2020, Winter 2020-21, Summer 2021
Description
During the summer of 2020, I worked as a part-time intern at S2N Health, a MedTech consulting company. I went into this experience unfamiliar with consulting and hesitant about the experience because I struggled to see how it would benefit my goal of being an engineer. However, I decided that it could be a good opportunity to experience medical device companies from another perspective. During Summer 2020, I worked on an independent project for the team researching the FDA Breakthrough Device Designation, a relatively new status at the time. I collected a lengthy database as a result of my research and performed qualitative and quantitative analysis on the companies receiving this designation. I compiled a slide deck of my research that my boss presented at a MassMedic Town Hall in December 2020. I worked with the team again that winter to polish and finalize the deck.
I enjoyed my work with the S2N team, and I wanted to experience what consulting was actually like, so I returned to S2N for a full-time internship during Summer 2021 as consulting intern working with other analysts. My responsibilities shifted to working directly on projects with clients at medical device companies of various sizes and at various stages of the development process. On these teams, I helped conduct primary & secondary research, analyze competitor companies, sized medical device markets, and more. I compiled qualitative and quantitative research into slide decks and presented insights during meetings with clients. Specifically, I advised a small startup with an early-stage product where the most opportunity was for their device in the Autism care pathway. I also researched the leaders in infectious disease testing for a multinational company looking to acquire. These are two examples of very different projects that I worked on, but each provided me with valuable insight into the pathway to launch a medical device, from product development to FDA approvals and go-to-market strategy.
Reflection
Building and analyzing the Breakthrough Device database was a particularly innovative part of my internship experience with S2N. The team had a lack of research regarding this status given its relatively recent creation, so my development of this tool enabled analysts to better advise their clients about the pros and cons of pursuing it. I taught the current analysts about the nuances of the status and the analysis that I performed and logged every device I could find. Then, the analysts could go back and use the database to identify a similar device to their client’s and see the impact of the designation on that company or draw out other insights.
During my second summer with S2N, I was very fortunate to be able to present a lot of my work to clients. I created comprehensive decks of my research and delivered my insights during meetings. Occasionally, the client would ask a question that I struggled to answer or didn’t think of when I was conducting my research, which felt like a failure. However, I reacted well and gave my best answer given my research to date, and then looked into that question to present to the client at the next meeting to ensure it was addressed. I learned from this that there will always be unexpected questions in my career, and it is okay to not know the answer right away as long as I create a game plan to answer it in the future.
My biggest takeaway from my internship at S2N was the importance of market analysis and customer identification in the development of a medical device. Science can be incredibly innovative to treat a disease or a condition, but if it doesn’t work within a physicians’ routine, it will never be adopted. This thought process can be lacking in the engineering side of development, so I aim to incorporate this into my own engineering career. I now have tangible skills that will aid me as an innovator, including primary and secondary research tactics, the ability to speak with professionals (i.e. physicians, clients), and the ability to synthesize and communicate insights. With an understanding of how to predict a medical device's success in the market, I am better prepared to achieve my goals of building a medical device startup.
Artifact
Final presentation for the MassMedic Town Hall from my internship during Summer 2020/Winter 2020. Work from Summer 2021 cannot be shared due to client confidentiality.
