Dave Bjork is a patient advocate and research evangelist with more than 20 years of progressive experience in non-profit advocacy, community-building and fundraising leadership roles. He is currently a consultant on the Patient Driven Design team at Medidata Solutions advising on bringing the patient voice to the clinical trial experience.
Dave is also host of the Research Evangelist podcast where he interviews people in life sciences that are brilliant but not famous. Previously Dave served 4 years as Director of Development and Community Relations at FRAXA Research Foundation where he was responsible for building relationships between the Fragile X community and biopharma companies to help advance treatment development in Fragile X syndrome. Before FRAXA Dave was Vice President of Development for the National Foundation for Cancer Research where he was responsible for all fundraising and advocacy efforts.
A lung cancer survivor, Bjork has made it his life mission to connect patients, biopharma companies, academic institutions and other key influencers to forge strong partnerships to focus on research. He also advocates for and builds bridges between patient groups and the biopharma industry. Bjork earned a BS in Economics and Finance from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and lives in the Boston area.
