You might think that foreign medical doctors may not easily choose to work in Korea, but Italian-born Paola Russo, who now leads a function within the pharmacovigilance group at Samsung Bioepis, seems to be an exception.

“Sharing a living dream with Samsung Bioepis, I joined wholeheartedly with great curiosity” Russo said, recalling the moment in 2018 when she decided to work for the Korean company.

Russo’s relationship with Korea traces back several more years. Trained in internal medicine at her alma mater, the University of Pavia in Italy, and with clinical research experience in rare diseases, she first visited Korea to attend conferences and got acquainted with local medical doctors working in the same field at Samsung Medical Center (SMC).

Later on, while pursuing a Ph. D. in biomedical informatics and bioinformatics at the same alma mater in Italy, Russo established a research collaboration on her thesis with a laboratory at Seoul National University (SNU), which led her to come and work in Korea as a researcher.

After completing her Ph.D. studies, she accepted an offer to join a U.N.-derived not-for-profit international organization, the International Vaccine Institute, headquartered in Korea. In this position, she collaborated with pharmaceutical companies for the first time and got exposure to the unmet needs of healthcare in low- to middle-income countries.

“Coming from clinical research in tertiary hospitals and academia, it was a new world for me to discover,” Russo admitted. “However, the more I learned over the years, the more questions arose.”

It was then that a new opportunity arrived on her doorstep when a former colleague from the SMC asked her to join Samsung Bioepis.

“I contemplated whether joining the pharmaceutical industry would be the right fit for me after obtaining experience in hospitals, academia, and a non-profit international organization,” she recalled.

At this crossroad in her career, Russo found answers from the company’s mission -- broadening access to life-changing biologic therapies wherever there is an unmet need.

“Considering my background on rare and neglected diseases, it appeared to be the perfect career transition, almost like ‘natural evolution,’” she said.

Dr. Russo explained that her group works as a matrix in cross-functional teams, detailing her responsibilities in the pharmacovigilance group at Samsung Bioepis. She identified this as one of the aspects of her job that she enjoys the most.

“I like that each person contributes differently with their expertise to achieve a common albeit complex task,” she said. “Collaboration is essential to facilitate open-mindedness and allow good ideas to be refined through teamwork.”

Russo joined the safety physician role and later became the leader of her function within the pharmacovigilance group. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), pharmacovigilance is the science and activities relating to the detection, assessment, understanding, and prevention of adverse effects or any other medicine/vaccine related problem throughout the product’s lifecycle.

“Normally, we monitor the safety profile of a drug throughout its lifecycle, which also includes before and after marketing authorization,” she explained.

In particular, at Samsung Bioepis, Russo works with biosimilar medicines which are approved only after being rigorously and thoroughly evaluated as safe and effective to the reference biologic medicine. In fact, biosimilars are expected to match the safety profile of the reference biologic medicine.

Russo emphasized the importance of data-driven evidence in her line of work where continuous collection and analysis of data is required to ensure safety and compliance.

Russo shared her thoughts on the advantages and disadvantages of Korea’s biopharmaceutical industry based on her experience at Samsung Bioepis. As she sees it, both stem from the same root cause of being young.

“As a relatively young company, the potential is high, the environment is very dynamic, and there are no boundaries to development,” she said.

“Samsung Bioepis represents a living dream for many all over the world already. It achieved global recognition, providing affordable, high-quality biosimilars to people who need them domestically and abroad.”

However, she quickly added. “Of course, investment of time and resources are required to grow into a leading biopharmaceutical company.”

She commented on her working environment. "My working language is English, and likewise, everyone at Samsung Bioepis is well-versed in business English since we liaise with multiple global external parties.”

However, she explained that communication is sometimes conducted in Korean to facilitate juniors clarifying a complicated matter during meetings. After spending more than seven years in Korea, Russo has basic Korean skills, so she is not fazed by this. She believes this is only inevitable in a mixed working environment and will be similar in other companies.

She divulged that she willingly took Korean classes at SNU out of interest in living in Korea.

Asked about her most memorable experience, Russo recalled her first three years, saying, “It is certainly memorable when a medicine is approved for use for the first time after dedicating long hours of hard work.”

“Since the clinical development of biosimilars is relatively fast compared to novel biologic drugs, I was able to contribute to the first marketing authorization of two medicines, SB8 (bevacizumab biosimilar) and SB11 (ranibizumab biosimilar),” she added.

“Especially during the pandemic,” she said, “I found everyone here challenging themselves to try and find the best solutions for the required adjustments in our projects, in order to keep steadily moving forward with both drug development and post-marketing activities. I was honoured to be a part of this team. This experience gave me a glimpse of Samsung Bioepis’ foundation, and I realized that, regardless of the crisis, this 10-year-old kid is deep-rooted and resilient so that it will grow, and I hope to continue growing my skills simultaneously.”

Offering a word of advice for others wishing to pursue a similar field in Korea, Russo said, “As a professional, you will come with your own culture and baggage of experiences. Likewise, as the newcomer, I recommend learning about your colleagues, to leverage on shared working values for synergistic teamwork.”

She further advised anyone wishing to work or live in Korea to consider learning at least conversational Korean, as the benefits outweigh the difficulties of learning a new language.

“Through these small efforts, you will realize yourself feeling at home in a foreign country and might even end up staying as long as I have.”