MIT'S PROGRAM ON THE PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRY

Annual Report of Research and Educational Programs
1996

3. Courses, Seminars, and Meetings

Education is an important component of POPI's role as a university-based center of expertise on the pharmaceutical industry. We offer courses and seminars for the MIT community, as well as meetings and symposia for pharmaceutical industry executives, regulators, and other industry-related constituencies.

At MIT, POPI educates doctoral-level students, who carry their new industry expertise to other universities and students. Our master's and bachelor's degree students use their knowledge in their pharmaceutical industry jobs. And those already working in the industry-whether in management or the sciences-benefit from special POPI educational offerings geared toward ensuring that practical applications of our research be developed whenever possible.

Since our founding, POPI faculty and students have participated in meetings organized by firms, trade organizations, professional societies, and other universities, where we present our work and exchange ideas. POPI representatives have testified before government agencies and legislative bodies, and many POPI faculty are regularly contacted by the news media for their perspectives on a host of issues facing the pharmaceutical industry and the healthcare sector in general.

COURSES AND SEMINARS AT MIT

Since POPI's founding, we have offered a number of subjects as part of MIT's regular academic catalogue. Those courses that predate POPI have been strengthened through our participation. We also have developed and offered a successful on-campus summer executive program for physicians, scientists, and engineers working in or with the pharmaceutical industry. These offerings are described below.

Seminar on Pharmaceutical and Biotechnology Industry Management (15.138J/10.940J/7.89J)

This seminar has been offered continually in the fall semester since 1991, bringing together graduate and undergraduate students in management, chemical engineering, and biology with leading academics from MIT and other universities. A large number of invited guests from industry also have participated. Typical attendance at the weekly meetings has been 40 to 45 people. The course content includes a mix of presentations of research by POPI faculty and the work of outside academics, coupled with the experiences of industry guests. This seminar has been evaluated very favorably by attendees, and has served as the point of entry through which students begin to engage in POPI activities.

Students taking this seminar for credit have prepared more than 100 papers addressing industry issues. Some of the work done by students over the last two academic years led to the following paper topics.

- Noninvasive Glucose Monitoring for Diabetes: Reverse Iontophoresis and Near Infrared-Red Spectroscopy

- Technology Transfer and the Development of New Drugs for Diabetes Mellitus

- Biogen and AVONEX: An Analysis of the Technology Transfer Process

- The Innovation History of Dexfenfluramine

- Development of Omeprazole: Market and Technology Considerations

- Pharmaceutical Mergers: Research Activity Before and After

- The Pre-Clinical Phase of the Drug Discovery/Development Process: Current Policies and Future Trends

- Mergers and Acquisitions in the U.S. Pharmaceutical Industry

- The Social and Economic Burden of Alzheimer's Disease

- Supplier Relations in the Pharmaceutical Industry

- Management Flight Simulator for Research-Intensive Pharmaceutical Companies

- Intellectual Property Issues and Pharmaceutical Company Expansion Into Emerging Markets

- Choosing the Appropriate Therapy: a1-Antitrypsin Deficiency as a Case Study

- Application of Herbal Extracts in Pharmaceutical Industry: A Case of Ginkgo Biloba

- The Current Face of the Pharmaceutical Drug Market: Example of H2 Antagonist Drugs

- Small Biotech Companies and the Discovery of Antifungal Drugs

- Farnesyl Transferase Inhibitors: Rational Drug Design, Preclinical Concerns, and Competitive Strategy

- Cholesterol Lowering Drugs and Their Alternative Uses: Insights in Drug Discovery

- Strategies to Extend Product Life When a Drug Comes Off Patent-Review of H2 Antagonist Market and Necessary Organizational Competitiveness

- Risk Management in a Pharmaceutical/Biotechnology Start-Up

- Biotechnology of Insulin

A number of new faculty-led POPI research projects began as exploratory student papers or projects as part of this class. Faculty and students continue to benefit significantly from such interaction.

Health Technology (15.136J/10.547J/HST920J)

This seminar, offered since the early 1980s, was restructured in 1991 to focus on the pharmaceutical industry. After several weeks of presentations from multidisciplinary faculty, teams of students focus their efforts on solving specific problems similar to those actually faced by individuals working in the industry. Industry guests attend to offer their perspectives on the scope and definitions of industry problems, and return later in the seminar to critique the solutions developed by students.

Typical enrollment has been 10 to 15 doctoral or master's degree students in management science or engineering, most of whom have already attended the Seminar on Pharmaceutical and Biotechnology Industry Management. This offering also has been favorably evaluated, and some participants have gone on to select graduate theses related to POPI faculty research.

Comparative Health Systems (15.141)

This course, developed by three POPI faculty, was first offered in the spring of 1994. It is the core of the Sloan School's offerings in the healthcare area. Presented in a lecture/discussion format, the course integrates the burgeoning multidisciplinary academic literatures on the healthcare industry with the practical perspectives of those who have worked in the pharmaceutical or medical device industries. Some twenty-five management and engineering graduate students take this course each year.

Industrial Economics for Strategic Decisions (15.013)

This academic subject is offered in the Applied Economics Center of the Sloan School. Since 1992, one-third of each semester has been devoted to addressing-in economic terms-strategic issues facing the pharmaceutical industry. Thirty-five student enrollees per year have interacted with guests from major research-based and generic drug firms, government regulatory agencies, and legislative staff.

Management for Physicians, Scientists and Engineers in the Pharmaceutical and Biotechnology Industry (15.06S)

This special summer executive program has been offered on campus each June since 1992. Enrollees-typically some 30 individuals from pharmaceutical firms and government worldwide-are exposed to the research and insights of POPI faculty and to abbreviated versions of excerpts of our regular academic subjects. This course has been evaluated favorably by the attendees and has formed the basis for new relationships between POPI faculty and students and those who work in the industry.

CONFERENCES AND SYMPOSIA

Beginning in November 1991, POPI has hosted or led conferences and symposia at MIT and elsewhere. These meetings have brought together industry, government, and academic participants-some 1,000 in all-to discuss essential pharmaceutical industry issues, as the following list illustrates.

The Future of the Pharmaceutical Industry, November 1991 (Cambridge)

Economics of Pharmaceuticals: A Global Perspective, May 1993 (Cambridge)

World Economic Forum Industry Summit, September 1993 (Cambridge)

Managing Resarch and Manufacturing in the Pharmaceutical Industry, June 1994 (Barcelona, Spain)

ILP Symposium on "Program on the Pharmaceutical Industry", November 1994 (Cambridge)

Redesigning Drug Development, February 1995 (Cambridge)

The Pharmaceutical Industry in the Twenty-First Century, November 1995 (Cambridge)

The Competitive Advantage of a Healthy Workforce, November 1996 (Naples, Florida)

The most recent conference, in Florida, was co-sponsored by POPI and Pfizer. Panel discussions featured noted academics, employers, government representatives, health benefits experts, and healthcare providers, who addressed how the health of workers relates to productivity as well as other issues raised by the rapid changes in healthcare options for employers. Some 150 attended.

The conference featured the presentation of preliminary findings of an ongoing POPI study that measures the effects of illness and treatment on productivity in a particular occupation, and a second study of how treatment of chronic depression affects workplace performance.

The full Florida conference program and list of attending organizations is presented in Appendix E.

INVITED SEMINARS

Since POPI's inception, a number of our faculty and several students have had the opportunity to make invited presentations to seminars or meetings organized by pharmaceutical firms, trade associations, or professional societies. Several faculty have served on distinguished panels or as invited experts providing testimony to legislative bodies.

The following is a partial list of organizations that have hosted POPI researchers as visitors or guest speakers over the last few years.

  • Abbott
  • Amgen
  • American Instrument Association
  • Ciba-Geigy
  • Duke University
  • Eli Lilly & Company
  • Glaxo
  • Hoffman LaRoche
  • Massachusetts Biotechnology Council
  • Merck
  • National Academy of Engineering
  • National Bureau of Economic Research
  • National Institutes of Health
  • Pfizer
  • Pharma (formerly the Pharmaceutical
  • Manufacturers Association)
  • Sandoz
  • Teva / Israel
  • U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
  • U.S. Department of Commerce
  • U.S. Department of Justice
  • U.S. Federal Trade Commission
  • U.S. Food and Drug Administration
  • UCLA
  • Zeneca

POLICY PANELS

POPI faculty are also frequently invited to participate on policy panels related to the pharmaceutical industry and healthcare. The following is a list of organizations that have sponsored such panels.

  • Ad Hoc Pharmaceutical Industry Economics Group
  • American Enterprise Institute
  • Brookings Institution
  • Drug Information Association
  • Food and Drug Law Institute
  • Institute of the Future
  • MIT Congressional Committee Staff Seminar
  • National Health Policy Forum
  • Northwest-Midwest Institute
  • U.K. Office of Health Economics
  • U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
  • U.S. Department of Commerce
  • U.S. Department of Justice
  • U.S. Federal Trade Commission
  • U.S. Food and Drug Administration
  • World Economic Forum

Please send comments and suggestions to popi-www@mit.edu

[Back to POPI Home Page]