Columbia Biostatistics Master OR Ohio State University Pharmaceutics PhD?

[williammomo]

I am admitted to Columbia University, majoring in Biostatistics. And Ohio State University offers me a PhD position, including scholarship and tution waive. I want to know which choice is better for my future career?

[iphi]

Well maybe if you told us what you're planning to make your future career we could help you better.

 

At first glance, the FUNDED PhD where cost of living is actually affordable. Why wouldn't you do that?

[williammomo]

Well maybe if you told us what you're planning to make your future career we could help you better.

 

At first glance, the FUNDED PhD where cost of living is actually affordable. Why wouldn't you do that?

Thanks for your kind reply! I want to work in a pharmacy company and I'm not sure what kind of work I really enjoy. I heard that the biostatisics field may be more promising in the future. On the other hand, PhDs usually have better career promotion. That is why I feel hard to make a choice.

[juilletmercredi]

You can't make this choice without knowing what you want to do - specifically.  Working at a pharmaceutical company is not, in and of itself, a career.

 

Getting a PhD in pharmaceutical sciences from Ohio State will position you to become a researcher in the pharmaceutical field.  You could work as a scientist in research and development at a company that produces pharmaceuticals (which would include employers like Merck and Bayer, but could also include cosmetic companies for example).  You could also work as a professor in a department of pharmaceutical sciences or an academic medical center.  Regardless, though, your primary role will be doing some kind of higher-level research work.  You may do more bench work in industry; some of it will also be research management.  After several years (7-10) you may want to move on to research management jobs or up in the company, but I'm not sure about the specifics of that.

 

Biostatisticians use statistical models and software packages to analyze data related to health and medicine - biomedical sciences, medicine, pharmaceuticals, etc.  An MS-level biostatistician can certainly work at a pharmaceutical company crunching numbers for the researchers; they also work at academic medical centers, at hospitals and clinics, at consulting firms, and at nonprofits.  Sometimes they take their work/expertise into other related fields (like insurance).  As a biostatistician, you won't be doing bench science work - trying to discover new drugs.  Instead, your work time will be spent essentially assisting the bench scientists by analyzing the statistical data they collect from their trials/experiments.  You might help conduct randomized controlled trials for the pharmaceutical company.  You might help plan the execution of these studies to ensure the fidelity of your data.  You'll spend a lot of time managing large amounts of data - cleaning and preparing it for analyses.  You'll also spend some time preparing the reports for people who don't know a lot about biostatistics, and explaining the data analysis results to those same folks.  As you gain more expertise (or a PhD) you may actually begin to create models and statistical techniques that can be used on your data, and write programs or packages for the statistical software you use.  Most top biostatisticians also develop strong computer programming skills.

 

So it really depends on what you want to do.  the PhD will enable you to take a direct scientist position.  The MS in biostatistics leads to a career that's really more like research support, which can also be enjoyable and lucrative.  Both can lead to good career promotion and it's difficult to predict ahead of time which field is going to "blow up."  Personally, I think if you are unsure, you should get the MS in biostatistics.  If you want, you can always go back and get a PhD.  And IMO, the PhD isn't worth the extra time if you aren't sure whether or not you want to be a scientist.

[williammomo]

You can't make this choice without knowing what you want to do - specifically.  Working at a pharmaceutical company is not, in and of itself, a career.

 

Getting a PhD in pharmaceutical sciences from Ohio State will position you to become a researcher in the pharmaceutical field.  You could work as a scientist in research and development at a company that produces pharmaceuticals (which would include employers like Merck and Bayer, but could also include cosmetic companies for example).  You could also work as a professor in a department of pharmaceutical sciences or an academic medical center.  Regardless, though, your primary role will be doing some kind of higher-level research work.  You may do more bench work in industry; some of it will also be research management.  After several years (7-10) you may want to move on to research management jobs or up in the company, but I'm not sure about the specifics of that.

 

Biostatisticians use statistical models and software packages to analyze data related to health and medicine - biomedical sciences, medicine, pharmaceuticals, etc.  An MS-level biostatistician can certainly work at a pharmaceutical company crunching numbers for the researchers; they also work at academic medical centers, at hospitals and clinics, at consulting firms, and at nonprofits.  Sometimes they take their work/expertise into other related fields (like insurance).  As a biostatistician, you won't be doing bench science work - trying to discover new drugs.  Instead, your work time will be spent essentially assisting the bench scientists by analyzing the statistical data they collect from their trials/experiments.  You might help conduct randomized controlled trials for the pharmaceutical company.  You might help plan the execution of these studies to ensure the fidelity of your data.  You'll spend a lot of time managing large amounts of data - cleaning and preparing it for analyses.  You'll also spend some time preparing the reports for people who don't know a lot about biostatistics, and explaining the data analysis results to those same folks.  As you gain more expertise (or a PhD) you may actually begin to create models and statistical techniques that can be used on your data, and write programs or packages for the statistical software you use.  Most top biostatisticians also develop strong computer programming skills.

 

So it really depends on what you want to do.  the PhD will enable you to take a direct scientist position.  The MS in biostatistics leads to a career that's really more like research support, which can also be enjoyable and lucrative.  Both can lead to good career promotion and it's difficult to predict ahead of time which field is going to "blow up."  Personally, I think if you are unsure, you should get the MS in biostatistics.  If you want, you can always go back and get a PhD.  And IMO, the PhD isn't worth the extra time if you aren't sure whether or not you want to be a scientist.

Thanks for you reply so much!!!