How much does it cost to hire a medical device consultant?

Hiring freelance specialists is a cost-effective way of accessing specialist expertise at short notice. Here’s how much it might cost to hire a medical device consultant.  

The medical device industry is dominated by small businesses that are innovating rapidly. In Europe alone, there are about 27,000 medical technology companies, of which 95% are small and medium-sized companies (SMEs). Between 2007 and 2017, the number of European patent applications for medical technology increased by around 50%.

Many of these SMEs cannot afford to hire experts full-time. They typically outsource their work to consulting agencies or contract workers. However, platforms like Kolabtree makes it easy to directly speak with freelancers and hire experts based on your budget.

Medical device consultants: Services

Medical device consultants offer several different kinds of services ranging from medical writing to statistical analysis. Here are the range of services offered by medical device experts:

Regulatory writers: Prepare regulatory documents, including clinical evaluation reports (CERs) for EU MDR, FDA applications, and more
Technical writers: Develop grant proposals for NIH or other funding agencies, write clinical trial protocols, research papers, and more
Freelance biostatisticians: Design robust clinical studies, optimize clinical trial design, analyze study results, make accurate inferences, verify research data and prepare it for publication
Medical content writers: Medical writers who can help with scientific content for blogs and white papers, SEO content for websites, educational content, and more
Systematic reviews: Systematic review and meta-analysis experts who can conduct a comprehensive literature search and provide meaningful insights
Product development consultants: Materials scientists and product development experts who can help with formulating new products or improving existing ones

Hire medical device consultant hourly or per project

Many medical device businesses face a resource gap while trying to reduce their time to market. They need to speak with a product development expert or a regulatory compliance expert, but are not sure how much it would cost to hire a medical device consultant. On freelancing platforms, you can choose to hire by the hour or play a flat fee per project, depending on how well defined the scope of your project is.

Medical device freelancers on Kolabtree work on an hourly rate ranging from $40 to $150. This, of course, depends on the complexity of the project and level of expertise required. Basic content writing, for example, can start at $100-150 for an article of about 600 words or so. A more technical article of about 3,000 words could cost $300-500.

If you have a well-defined scope and a clear goal and deliverable for your project, you could set a fixed rate. A clinical evaluation report for a medical device, for example, would cost between $3,000 and $8,000.

Medical device consultant hourly rate

Medical device consulting rates also depend on how well-scoped your project is. For example, if you’re looking for a CER, do you need just the written report, or also support with clinical trial data analysis and literature reviews? Once your outline at which stage you are in the product development cycle or regulatory pathway, the expert can estimate the amount of work needed and give you a realistic quote.

Here are approximate hourly rates (all in USD) based on the level of expertise required.

Freelance medical writer: $30-80 per hour
Medical device consultant: $100-120 per hour
Senior medical device consultant: $200-300 per hour, approximately $2,000 a day
Regulatory consultant hourly rate: $150-200

For medical device companies that need hand-holding at every stage of their product development process, including meeting regulatory requirements and following ISO standards, it could cost up to $20,000 a week to work with a specialist. This investment is more often than not, worth it, as rushing a product to market without the counsel of an expert can cause serious and unintended harm to human lives, product recall, reputation damage and huge financial losses. However, with ease of access to freelance medical device consultants, companies can hire experts on demand for smaller tasks within limited budgets, as and when they reach that stage in the cycle. Consultants are also becoming increasingly accessible to SMBs and startups, offering support at lower rates.

Examples of medical device consulting projects

Kolabtree has helped medical device companies worldwide access the expertise they need to reduce time to market. Here are some examples.

1. The founder of a US-based medical device company hired a scientific writer for supporting research for the launch of a new product.
   Cost: USD 2750 | Time Taken: 20 Days
2. A medical device company hired a biostatistician from the Netherlands to review the results of their pre-clinical study and prepare it for journal publication.
   Cost: USD 500 | Time Taken: 1 Week
3. An Australian medical device innovation company hired a Mexico-based nanotechnology expert to develop electrodes that could destroy living tissue.
   Cost: USD 2000 | Time Taken: 1 Month

Need help to take a medical device to market? Consult qualified experts on Kolabtree. Post your project and get quotes for free. Get started now.