Meghana Karnik-Henry is the director of evidence generation at Siemens Healthineers and drives non-registrational research activities and external collaborations to support the company’s neurology biomarker assay portfolio. She also provides neurology subject matter expertise for regulatory submissions. Karnik-Henry has further contributed neurology and neuroscience expertise to inform early-stage research and development strategy on biomarker assay development.
Previously she was on the Medical Strategy team at an international pharmaceutical company specializing in treatments for neurologic and psychiatric diseases. While there she led Phase IV real-world evidence generation initiatives, and participated in product lifecycle management, including contributing to the development and execution of the launch strategy for a key neurology product.
In addition to her passion for neuroscience Karnik-Henry uses her scientific background to innovatively solve problems wherever she identifies a need. As an example at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic when personal protective equipment for healthcare providers was scarce she applied foundational chemistry principles and synthesized results from agricultural, dental, and microbiology studies to independently define and publish a protocol on the potential use of two over-the-counter solutions as a prophylaxis to mitigate the effects of exposure to SARS-CoV-2.
Karnik-Henry believes women’s health is another area of immense unmet need and she is enthusiastic about raising awareness and identifying innovative solutions to the problems encountered in this space. In her previous role she led a cross-functional effort engaging with the Women’s Preventive Services Initiative to advocate for inclusion of migraine screening as part of women’s well-visits. She was also a part of her company’s Working Mothers’ group that championed better parental benefits for United States employees. The group’s advocacy efforts resulted in several weeks added to the existing maternity leave program and the launch of a novel paternity leave program.
Prior to her work in industry Karnik-Henry was a visiting assistant professor at Skidmore College where she pioneered the development and teaching of courses in behavioral and biological ethics and the cognitive neuroscience of adult development and aging. Among the topics explored were ethical and neurologic/neuropsychiatric considerations related to gender identity, stem cell research, and the impact of age-related hormone changes on cognition. More recently she has served as an invited lecturer providing career development guidance to life science graduate students curious about industry.