President’s Message - Volume 25, Issue

Dear EMWA Members, It is my very great pleasure to ‘speak’ to you from the pages of the very first issue of Medical Writing of 2016, with our new printer, Hastings. I am particularly excited that our feature articles are now open-access – a…

Passing the torch - Volume 21, Issue

This issue is the first where I will be serving as Editor-in-Chief of Medical Writing (MEW). Elise Langdon-Neuner, Editor-in-Chief since 2004, will be stepping down. This is yet another step in the evolution of the journal.

For those of you unfamili…

Out On Our Own - Volume 22, Issue

The EMWA autumn conference is always so well placed in November, giving us the chance to meet friends and colleagues before the onslaught of traditional end of year festivities. Barcelona's conference was no exception. We were pleased to welcome new …

Lay titles for clinical trials: Is industry achieving the balance? - Volume 32, Issue

Titles of clinical trials may directly influence whether patients, caretakers, or healthcare professionals will want to obtain more information about the trial. Major clinical trial registries require lay titles (referred to as “brief” or “public”…

The 360° approach to authoring risk management plans - Volume 28, Issue

Amidst the dynamic landscape of pharma - covigilance legislation, medical writers have been gaining increased visibility and importance beyond what had been their traditional role of coordinating and facil it - ating the development of risk…

The Webscout - Volume 24, Issue

The word ‘plain’ in its original sense just meant ‘flat, smooth’. In the thirteenth century, it also gained the meaning ‘evident’. And from the fourteenth century on, ‘plain’ has been used in the way we understand it in the term ‘plain language’: to…

Translation: A transcultural activity - Volume 29, Issue

Effective communication is the goal of any professional medical and communication writer. Transferring the correct messages from one language to another is a task that is increasingly covered by software, but translation machines cannot confer the…

Good medical writing saves lives – and even a little comma can make a difference - Volume 26, Issue

Hello, I am a comma, and I dedicate this essay to the medical writer who gave my life a new meaning and direction. He might even have saved me. I was in quite a depressed state because people did not seem to care about me anymore. Then this guy came…

Get your (visual) act together: Optimising the design of labels and arrows in medical illustrations - Volume 29, Issue

There is an enhanced communicating power of text when associated with visuals. This is a compelling argument for furnishing medical writers with basic knowledge on how to adapt and create simple figures. This  article discusses tips on adding labels…

Good Writing Practice - Volume 31, Issue

The indefinite article a functions as a determiner before a singular count noun, either tangible (a human) or abstract (a trait). This determiner indicates that the noun is either being mentioned for the first time or is general (indefinite) in meani…