Employee of the Month: Mei-Chun Chen
The Sanaria employee of the month for February 2024 is Mei-Chun Chen. Mei is a member of the clinical team at Sanaria, responsible for managing trial master files and ensuring that documentation for Sanaria’s clinical studies are in compliance.
Mei has been nominated in recognition of her superb work supporting the Indonesian soldier trial of PfSPZ Vaccine and PfSPZ-CVac that is ending this month. This unique trial is the first in history in which a malaria vaccine has been administered to malaria-naive individuals who have then been challenged with malaria to test vaccine efficacy not by administering CHMI (as has been done universally in the past), but by exposing the vaccine recipients to natural transmission. This is possible in Indonesia because it is the only situation we know of in the world that malaria-naive soldiers are deployed to malaria-endemic sites without taking chemoprophylaxis.
The Indonesia trial, funded by the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program (CDMRP), is one of the most important clinical trials Sanaria has ever sponsored, because it is the only trial that realistically evaluates our vaccines for their ability to protect malaria-naive travelers against naturally transmitted Pf and Pv malaria. Because our vaccines are derived from a West African strain of Pf, and the parasites transmitted at the deployment site in Indonesian West New Guinea are the most antigenically distinct from our vaccine in the world, the trial represents a highly stringent test of vaccine efficacy. In other words, if our vaccines work in New Guinea, they should work anywhere in the world.
We are so fortunate that Mei-Chun Chen has served as Sanaria’s Senior Clinical Research Manager for this trial. She has provided oversight for every aspect of study, but her focus has been on making sure that the trial was conducted according to good clinical practices, according to the clinical protocol, and according to the highest standards for data quality. Mei’s location in Taipei, which shares roughly the same time zone as Indonesia, has allowed much easier communication with the clinical team conducting the trial, and also with the external monitor (Prodia) and with our data management and analysis company (StatPlus). She has been able to maintain superb relationships with our colleagues at the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit who, along with the University of Indonesia Faculty of Medicine and the Indonesian Army, conducted the trial. Mei has personally supervised all the monitoring and data cleaning; she has reviewed nearly the entire data set for accuracy; and she has made sure that all documentation is complete in our Trial Master File. Her work has resulted in some of the highest quality clinical data set in Sanaria’s history.
We would like to recognize Mei’s excellent work on this trial and also want to mention what a delight it is to work with Mei, who is always professional in her interactions, has a superb work ethic, and has won the hearts of everyone on the trial team with her warmth and caring. Mei, thank-you for your dedication and superb work – this trial is a crowning achievement for Sanaria and you are the primary person here at Sanaria making this accomplishment possible. Congratulations!
Mei holds a MS and BS from the National Cheng Kung University of Taiwan in Microbiology and Immunology, and Medical Laboratory Science and Biotechnology. Mei joined Sanaria in March, 2017.
