Aurora is strengthening its client offer with two senior hires to head important knowledge centres within the agency. Stephen O’Farrell joins as Director and Head of Patient Engagement and Bettina Seri as Director and Head of Medical Communications.

Following an illustrious academic career, including a PhD in neuroscience from The Rockefeller University and three years as a postdoctoral research fellow at Harvard Medical School, Bettina gained more than 14 years’ experience in medical education and communications at a number of London-based agencies. This included senior strategic roles at MKG Global, ApotheCom and, most recently, Pollen Health, where she was Scientific Strategy and Business Director. Bettina joins Aurora as a member of the leadership team to head up the agency’s growing medical communications capabilities into a unique promotional medical communication offering that aims to facilitate peer-to-peer discussion and scientific exchange among opinion experts. Promotional medical communications will bring medical and commercial functions together, forming a seamless partnership of creativity and scientific expertise.

With a background in both journalism and patient advocacy, Stephen was instrumental in establishing Aurora’s innovative patient engagement practice when he was previously at the agency. Following 18-months as a senior consultant at Wilson Hartnell in Dublin, Stephen now rejoins Aurora’s leadership team with a remit to further develop the patient engagement offer, which includes clinical trial recruitment, patient activation, disease awareness and advocacy relations.

Jonny Holland, Associate Director Clinical Trial Recruitment at Spectrum Science, Aurora’s US partner in the GHMC network, has also joined the team in London to build the clinical trial recruitment offering in the UK and Europe.

Chris Bath, Aurora’s Managing Director, comments, “Aurora has ambitious plans to extend how we support our clients by adding new capabilities and integrated expertise. The future of our business is reliant on true agency-client partnership, focused on solving their biggest challenges. We are therefore delighted to welcome – and welcome back – Bettina and Stephen who are both inspiring leaders and pre-eminent experts in their respective fields.”