Biography

Soju Chang is the chief of the Initiatives & Consortium-Wide Activities Section of the Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) Program Branch within NCATS’ Division of Clinical Innovation. Chang joined NCATS as a medical officer and program director in November 2018. He manages a portfolio of CTSA Program grants, leads the CTSA Program Collaborative Innovation Awards (CCIA), and represents NCATS on NIH’s Maternal Mortality Task Force for the Implementing a Maternal health and PRegnancy Outcomes Vision for Everyone (IMPROVE) Initiative and the Accelerating COVID-19 Therapeutic Interventions and Vaccines (ACTIV) public-private partnership’s ACTIV-1 platform trial leadership group. In addition, he contributed to the Trial Innovation Network–supported clinical trials in the Pain Management Effectiveness Research Network as part of the NIH Helping to End Addiction Long-term^® Initiative, or NIH HEAL Initiative^®.

Prior to joining NCATS, Chang served as a medical officer/medical monitor at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases for 10 years. He began his career in the U.S. Public Health Service as an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2001. From there, he transferred to the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration as a medical epidemiologist in 2003.

Chang received his M.D. from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. He completed his preventive medicine residency and M.P.H. program at Johns Hopkins University and is board certified in public health and general preventive medicine. He is a fellow of the American College of Preventive Medicine. He also is a certified principal investigator and holds a Regulatory Affairs Certification.

Research Topics

Throughout his career in the fields of biomedical science and public health, Chang has acquired diverse experience and developed his professional interest in translational science, pharmacovigilance and pharmacoepidemiology, development and conduct of early phase clinical trials, and post-marketing studies and surveillance systems. He has worked with the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System and with data and safety monitoring committees. Chang also has experience in human subjects protections and has served on an institutional review board. In addition, he is experienced in regulatory and clinical research affairs, health care quality and promotion, hospital infection control, public health emergency and disaster response, applied epidemiology, and population medicine. He is enthusiastic about enhancing collaboration with NCATS Divisions and Offices; NIH Institutes, Centers, and Offices; and sister federal agencies to leverage the expertise and resources of the CTSA Program and promoting translational science principles to the biomedical and behavioral research community.