Education and qualifications
- University courses: There are no medical writing courses offered at the undergraduate level in Australasia. Instead, medical writers can start with degrees in fields such as journalism, media and communications.
- Postgraduate courses: Some universities offer postgraduate courses in healthcare communication, including:
- Short courses: Writers looking to upskill in specific areas can take short courses in topics including editing, consumer health writing, freelance writing, magazine writing and technical writing.
- Science journalism – a free online course for budding science writers and journalists, developed by a team of 35 writers and editors.
- Magazine and newspaper writing – Australian Writers Centre
- Fundamentals of technical writing – University of Western Australia
- Courses in journalism, editing and publishing – Australian College
- AMWA PDP: AMWA’s PDP program offers specialised medical writing-related training
Useful websites about medical writing
- From academic to medical writer – a guide to getting started in medical communications
- MedCommsNetworking – networking and dialogue amongst professionals working in med comms
- Science communication toolkit – practical tools developed by experts to help science communicators, researchers, journalists and policy makers add quality, impact and influence to their science engagement activities
- Ragan’s Healthcare Communications News – a daily website that highlights the latest news in health care social media, marketing, health communications, Pharma, Physicians and mobile health
- Health Writer Hub – blogs, short online health writing courses and free resources for health writers (run by AMWA President Michelle Guillemard)
Dictionaries
- Stedman’s Medical Dictionary
- Dorland’s Illustrated Medical Dictionary
- Macquarie Dictionary. 5th edn. Sydney: Macquarie Library Online
Codes and guidelines
Accessing journals
- PubMed – free archive of journal literature with links to the full-text sources
- Accessing journal articles – if you are curious about open access and accessing research behind academic paywalls, this article might be of interest
Style and grammar resources
- Cambridge Guide to Australian English Usage
- AMA Manual of Style
- Scientific Style and Format: the CSE Style Manual for Authors, Editors and Publishers
- Australian Manual of Scientific Style
Health reporting
- Reporting on Health – an informative website for health journalists
- Reporting on data in health stories – available as a downloadable eBook
Medical writing associations
- American Medical Writers Association
- European Medical Writers Association
- Australian Science Communicators
- Freelance Editors’ Network
- Council of Science Editors
- World Association of Medical Editors
- European Association of Science Editors
- The Board of Editors in the Life Sciences (BELS)
- The International Society for Medical Publication Professionals (ISMPP)
- Society for Technical Communication
- International Science Writers Association
- American Copy Editors Society
- Canadian Science Writers Association
- Association of Health Care Journalists
- Freeline – The Australian Freelance Writers Network