NervGen Pharma Corp. appointed Shamim Ruff as Chief Regulatory Affairs Officer and Christine McSherry as Senior Vice President (SVP), Patient Advocacy and Clinical Affairs. Shamim Ruff brings more than 30 years of strategic leadership in regulatory affairs to NervGen, where she will oversee the company?s regulatory strategy and work closely with the executive team to support the realization of NervGen?s mission to transform the lives of individuals living with SCI.
Most recently, Ms. Ruff served as Chief Regulatory Affairs Officer and SVP, Head of Quality Assurance at Stoke Therapeutics, leading regulatory strategy for the company's RNA medicine platform. Prior to Stoke, Ms. Ruff served as Chief Regulatory Affairs Officer at Sarepta Therapeutics, where she built the company's regulatory affairs and quality organizations and led regulatory strategy for its rare and infectious disease pipelines. She also served as Chair of the Development Advisory Board and Strategic Regulatory Advisor to the CEO and NDA Submissions Team at Soleno Therapeutics and on the Board of Directors of Reata Pharmaceuticals until its acquisition by Biogen.
Her earlier career included leadership roles at Sanofi-Genzyme, Amgen, Abbott, and AstraZeneca. Ms. Ruff holds a master's degree in analytical chemistry from the University of Loughborough, U.K., and a bachelor's degree in chemistry and biology from the University of Leicester, U.K. Christine McSherry brings more than 30 years of experience bridging patient advocacy and clinical development. She will play a pivotal role in ensuring the voice of the SCI community is central to NervGen?s clinical strategy.
Previously, Ms. McSherry co-founded Casimir, a clinical research organization that worked across more than 20 rare diseases, capturing and quantifying patient and caregiver perception of treatment benefit. Casimir's work pioneered the development of outcome measures to advance the FDA's patient-focused drug development initiative. Ms. McSherry served as CEO of Casimir until its acquisition by Emmes.
In 2001, she founded the Jett Foundation, after the diagnosis of her son, Jett, with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD). The Foundation became a leading voice for affected families and played a central role in the advocacy efforts that contributed to the FDA's approval of Exondys 51, the first approved therapy for DMD. Ms. McSherry continues to serve as a Director of the Jett Foundation and previously served on the Board of Directors of the Duchenne Alliance.
She holds a BSN from Northeastern University and is a registered nurse.
