The Schain Research team

Malin Almgren, PhD

CEO

Dr Almgren holds a MSc in Chemistry from Stockholm University and a PhD in Medicine from Karolinska Institutet. With over 20 years in medical research, she has deep knowledge in several fields including genetics, immunology, neuroscience, and oncology including clinical trials and collaborations with industry. As an Assistant Professor at Karolinska Intitutet, she focused on environmental impact on autoimmunity and neonatology.
In addition to her scientific experience, she has a second career in finance, having held positions as Director for strategic partnerships at a Swedish asset manager with focus on sustainable investment, and most recently as financial advisor, supporting M&A transactions in the healthcare sector at Experia Corporate Finance Advisors AB.

Christina Jones, PhD

Scientific Director and Data Protection Officer

Dr Jones has a PhD in Developmental Biology from Monash University, Australia, and has worked as a postdoctoral researcher at Karolinska Institutet, studying human kidney regeneration. Christina has experience in preclinical research, project management, commercialization, academia/industry/clinical partnerships and scientific writing.

Frida Schain, PhD

Scientific Director

Dr Schain has a MSc in Molecular Biology from Lund University and a PhD in Medicine, Hematology, from Karolinska Institutet, where she focused on molecular aspects of inflammation and lymphoma pathogenesis. Her broad experience ranges from academic research and early drug discovery to the medical device and pharmaceutical industry. Her pharmaceutical industry experience includes leadership roles in medical affairs, real-world evidence, epidemiology and commercial aspects of drug development.

Kelvin Kwok, PhD

Senior Scientist

Dr Kwok studied Biochemistry at Oxford University and did his PhD in Endocrinology at University of Hong Kong. He has also worked as a postdoctoral researcher at Karolinska Institutet focusing on metabolic diseases before joining Schain Research. He is experienced in pre-clinical and clinical research, data analytics and scientific writing.

Tina Jacob, PhD

Senior Scientist

Dr Jacob holds a PhD from Karolinska Institutet. Before joining Schain Research she focused on dermatology, oncology, and diagnostic assays. She is experienced in pre-clinical research, data analytics, ethical applications, project management, and scientific writing.

Eva Herweijer, PhD

Senior Scientist

Dr Herweijer has a PhD in Epidemiology from Karolinska Institutet, where she worked on a register based evaluation of HPV vaccination programs. Eva has over 10 years of experience within real-world evidence, including several years of working in industry as a senior research consultant and analyst. Eva is experienced in study design, data analytics, scientific writing and project management.

Ahmad Abbadi, MD

Scientist

Dr Abbadi holds an MD from Jordan University of Science and Technology and a MSc in Medical Sciences in Public Health Epidemiology from Karolinska Institutet. He has previously worked with academia, governmental and non-governmental organizations. He has experience in tobacco control, urological epidemiology, project management, clinical research, data analysis and scientific writing.

Erwei Zeng, PhD

Scientist

Dr Zeng has a PhD in Epidemiology from Karolinska Institutet. Prior to joining Schain Research, Dr Zeng completed her masters and PhD focusing on population-based oncology research. Her expertise spans over critical components of treatment analysis in RWE including comparative effectiveness, determinants of treatment, and safety. She is also highly experienced in using utilizing data from national health registers to understand disease burden and survival outcomes.

Robyn Donrovich Thoren, MSc

Senior RWE Consultant

Robyn has a MSc from Stockholm University in Demography and a BA in Economics from New York University. Bringing over 6 years of industry experience in real-world evidence, Robyn has worked on diverse range of research projects across multiple therapeutic areas including autoimmune, cardiometabolic, oncology, and rare diseases. She has conducted epidemiological studies across Europe, leveraging real-world data including Nordic registers and other European data sources. Robyn has experience in strategic guidance, project management, regulatory studies, study design, and scientific writing.

Maria Wahlström

Finance and HR Manager

Maria holds a degree in accounting economics and payroll management with long and broad experience with project, sales, and marketing management within several industries and brands. She is also responsible for our Human Resources department and payroll management.

Elin Ramström

Research Operations Manager

Elin holds an MSc. in Molecular Biotechnology Engineering from Uppsala University, Sweden, and has several years of project management experience in Market Access and RWE research from the pharma industry. She’s a certified associate in Project Management from the Project Management Institute (PMI) and graduated from the School of Entrepreneurship at Uppsala University, Sweden, in 2019.

Susanne Kihlblom, MSc

RWE Director

Susanne holds an MSc. in Pharmacy, and has extensive experience in the pharmaceutical industry, in which she has been active for more than 20 years! Her experience and insight from roles in multiple big-pharma companies will be a valuable asset to our team. For the last 9 years, Susanne has worked with Real World Evidence in the consultancy business and thus has long-time experience in understanding and meeting clients’ evidence-generation needs.

Board of Directors

Lars Johansson

Chairman of the Board

Lars Johansson brings 30 years of experience from the medtech and pharmaceutical industry, including 13 years as General Manager for Janssen, Johnson & Johnson in the Nordics. Lars has a track record of being an extraordinary leader and his experience covers all strategic and operational aspects of bringing innovative treatments to patients.

Frida Schain, PhD

Founder and Board Member

Dr Schain has a MSc in Molecular Biology from Lund University and a PhD in Medicine, Hematology, from Karolinska Institutet, where she focused on molecular aspects of inflammation and lymphoma pathogenesis. Her broad experience ranges from academic research and early drug discovery to the medical device and pharmaceutical industry. Her pharmaceutical industry experience includes leadership roles in medical affairs, real-world evidence, epidemiology and commercial aspects of drug development. Most recently, she was a Global Director at Janssen, Johnson & Johnson, focusing on evidence generation from a market access and medical affairs perspective. In this role she was also a member of the global real-world evidence leadership team.

Malin Heyman

Board Member

Malin Heyman has more than 20 years of experience from financial services at SEB and Nasdaq as well as co-founder of a fintech company, Swimbird AB. Her roles have ranged from business development, sales to leadership as head of financial services and products. With extensive experience from strategic work, process development and digitalisation, Malin will bring significant value to the organisation as we continue to develop our capabilities and services in evidence generation and health data sciences.

Oskar Wibling, PhD

Board Member

Dr Wibling holds an MSc in Engineering Physics and a PhD in Computer Science, both from Uppsala University. His doctoral thesis work focused on formal verification methods, specifically with application to computer network protocols. Oskar has more than 25 years of experience from developing distributed, high-performance, systems for clients such as the Singapore Exchange (SGX), and has founded and built several successful IT companies.

Alf Thiel Metelius

Board Member

Alf has long experience from business development and building companies and has held positions as head of innovation and business development. Alf has a long experience of building consultant companies and accelerating companies’ growth journeys.

Philip Abrahamsson

Board Member

Philip has extensive experience from financial analysis and M&A transactions from Ernst & young and Grant Thornton. Philip assists Schain in strategic evaluations, reporting structure and in laying the foundation for future growth.

Magnus Björkholm, MD, PhD

Senior Professor of Medicine, Karolinska University Hospital and Karolinska Institutet

Professor Björkholm´s research is focused on clinical, experimental and epidemiological studies of malignant hematological diseases, with particular expertise in lymphoma, leukemia, myeloma and myeloproliferative neoplasms. He has authored more than 500 peer reviewed papers.