Therapeutic Area & Clinical Survey Expert

What you'll do

You review physician and patient research surveys for clinical and therapeutic-area accuracy. Concretely: you evaluate whether the disease terminology, treatment pathways, therapies, clinical scenarios and response options in a questionnaire actually reflect real-world practice, and flag what is inaccurate, outdated, ambiguous, or simply missing.

The judgement being bought is whether a question makes sense to the physician who will answer it. Does the answer list omit a therapy that is now standard? Does a staging question use terminology that shifted two guideline revisions ago? Does the flow assume a treatment sequence nobody follows any more?

You then write evidence-based recommendations for fixing it. You may collaborate with survey methodologists (a Healthcare Survey Research & Pharma Insights Expert is staffed on the same initiative) or, where qualified, independently assess both the clinical content and the survey design.

An MD is not required, and the ad says so twice

"An MD is not required" appears in the opening paragraph and again in the qualifications: "MD or clinical degree is welcome but not required."

What it wants instead is three or more years in a therapeutic area, from any of: medical affairs, healthcare or life-sciences consulting, medical writing, clinical research, pharmaceutical research, market research, scientific communications, or clinical practice.

If you have spent years in medical affairs or med comms on a specific disease and assumed the clinical review work went to physicians, this listing says otherwise.

The therapeutic areas in demand

Four are named, with specifics:

• Oncology / urologic oncology: prostate cancer, staging, treatment sequencing, systemic therapies, evolving standards of care
• Gastroenterology / IBD: ulcerative colitis, disease severity, biologics, targeted therapies, remission, treatment pathways
• Neurology: migraine, acute and preventive treatment, chronic versus episodic disease, symptoms, patient experience
• Pulmonology / respiratory: COPD, diagnosis, treatment, and management by both pulmonologists and PCPs

These are narrow and specific. Deep expertise in one of the four is worth considerably more here than broad familiarity across many.

What you need

• Three or more years of professional experience in a relevant therapeutic or clinical area
• Deep understanding of the disease, the treatment landscape, and real-world clinical decision-making
• A background in medical affairs, clinical research, medical writing, life-sciences consulting, pharma market research, healthcare insights, or clinical practice
• The ability to spot clinically inaccurate or incomplete survey questions
• Strong written communication and analytical judgement

Nice to have

• Experience with physician or patient market research
• Experience designing or fielding pharmaceutical market research surveys: candidates with this are called "particularly valuable"

What it pays

A flat $200/hour, not a band, with no task-based or output-based qualification anywhere in the ad. It is an hourly rate for hours worked.

You are engaged as an independent contractor; tax is not withheld, and local registration and reporting are on you. See our FAQ on tax handling.

What is not stated

These gaps matter for planning:

• No hours commitment. Fully remote and "on your own schedule", with no weekly minimum or maximum
• No project dates, though projects can be extended, shortened, or concluded early
• No vetting process. No steps are described at all
• No location requirement, so eligibility is left open
• The AI research organisation is not named

Worth knowing

Good:

• $200/hour flat, a single number rather than a range, for hours worked
• No MD required, stated twice, for work that is unmistakably clinical
• Non-clinical routes in are named explicitly: med affairs, med comms, consulting, market research
• Three years is a modest floor for a rate this high
• Fully remote on your own schedule, with no stated weekly commitment
• The work is stated not to require confidential information from your employer
• "Opportunities for continued engagements" across disease areas are mentioned

Less good:

• The four therapeutic areas are specific. Adjacent oncology experience is not prostate cancer experience
• No hours, no dates, no duration: you cannot plan income around it
• No vetting process described, so you cannot judge the time cost of applying
• Projects can be "concluded early depending on needs and performance"
• Independent contractor: no benefits, no notice period, your own tax and any local registration
• The client and the AI research organisation are both unnamed

About this listing

Posted by Mercor, confirmed open on 7 September 2026. The $200/hour rate, the four therapeutic areas, the qualifications and the "MD is not required" statements are its own published text for this listing.

No location requirement, no weekly hours and no project dates are stated, so those fields are left open rather than inferred. The AI research organisation and the end client are not named. Eligibility and payment run at the platform level. See Mercor and who can actually do this work.