How can you be a successful healthcare analyst without having a medical background?

I’ll answer this seriously. Yes, it’s possible, but it’s not as common. There’s a bigger technical moat the closer you get to pure trial analysis. Why? It’s a complex, data driven exercise. You usually have a set of precedents to compare an asset to, and you need to probability adjust for the data you have, the data you don’t, and the data you could never have before a catalyst to set expectations. That work is usually dense, and someone who hasn’t spent significant time reading, writing, or debating scientific literature will likely find it daunting.

That said, it really is still a data exercise. If you’re a voracious reader and comfortable building a knowledge base in something unfamiliar, you can absolutely succeed.

Will it take more time than for someone who doesn’t need to learn a disease pathway before understanding how a drug could work? Yes. But plenty of PhDs/MD's who succeed in this job do so less because of the degree and more because they’ve developed strong self directed learning habits and are willing to engage. In my opinion, a pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics textbook, high school level statistics, and a lot of will can take you very far.

Getting someone to give you a shot is a different story, and unfortunately not well within your control. The way I see this most often occur is those with undergrad degrees in a STEM field are usually given a chance as juniors to model for those running risk, they either graduate into more responsibility or are seen as permanent support before bouncing around/pivoting into something else.