Executive Director, Epidemiology
Merck and Co., Inc., Kenilworth, New Jersey, USA
Brief Bio of Edward A. Bortnichak, Ph.D., MPH, MBE
Dr. Bortnichak is the Executive Director and Global Head of the Pharmacoepidemiology and Database Research Unit (PEDRU) within the Pharmacoepidemiology Department of Merck & Co., Inc.. He is responsible for the oversight of all epidemiology research utilizing large automated databases in the support of Merck investigational compounds and marketed products.
Ed's career in the pharmaceutical industry spans 30 years. Immediately before joining Merck, he was Vice President, Scientific and Medical Healthcare Relations for Astra Zeneca and, prior to that role, he served as the Executive Director of Quantitative Decision Sciences for Astra Zeneca, U.S. Clinical Development. In that latter position at Astra Zeneca he managed a multifunctional department of approximately 500 professionals in epidemiology, outcomes research, informatics, statistics, programming, and medical writing supporting all phases of U.S. clinical drug development and post marketing evaluation. Prior to his time at Astra Zeneca, Ed held leadership positions managing Research Integration, Statistics, Epidemiology, Drug Safety and Outcomes Research Departments for Sanofi-Synthelabo, Ciba-Geigy, Berlex Laboratories, Pfizer and Ingenix. Prior to his industry career, he co-directed a community heart health behavior change program in Rhode Island and held a faculty post at Brown University
Ed did his undergraduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania. He holds a Ph.D. in chronic disease epidemiology from the Yale University Graduate School and a Masters of Public Health (MPH) from the Yale University School of Medicine and a Masters of Bioethics (MBE) from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. His post-doctoral work (at Yale) was in advanced statistical methods, and he currently holds a faculty position as a lecturer in Epidemiology at Yale.