White Paper
ICON Insight: Enhancing Patient Recruitment: How Sites, Sponsors, And CROs Can Interact More Effectively
Click Here To Download:
•ICON Newsletter — ICON Insight: Enhancing Patient Recruitment: How Sites, Sponsors, And CROs Can Interact More Effectively
Patient recruitment is one of the most critical challenges to overcome in clinical trials. It accounts for over 27% of the cost of drug development today. Yet more than 80% of clinical trials will miss their enrollment deadlines. In the U.S., on average, most studies are delayed by at least six months. These delays can cost pharmaceutical companies millions of dollars in sales.
The quest to lower costs and reduce delays in study enrollment has led many sponsors and CROs to move clinical studies from the U.S. and Western Europe to Eastern Europe, Latin America, and Asia Pacific. Driven by an extensive untapped patient population, a high level of expertise and cost efficiency, the trend toward globalization is set to continue. But even in emerging regions, recruiting patients who meet study protocols is still a major challenge.
What can sponsors and CROs do to expedite enrollment? In the majority of countries, media advertising and the Internet are powerful tools for reaching potential patient volunteers. But over 25% of adults in the U.S., and 34% of adults outside the U.S. learn about clinical trials from a medical provider. And when asked where they would prefer to learn about a clinical trial, an overwhelming number of respondents (51% in the U.S.; 53% outside the U.S.) indicated that they preferred to learn about clinical research opportunities from their physician.
The preference of patients for learning about clinical trials from a personal physician or specialist underlines the key role that sites and investigators play in the enrolment process. Pablo Pergola, M.D., Ph.D., a San Antonio, Texas nephrologist and principal investigator on many clinical studies, believes that "physicians need to drive the recruitment process at clinical sites."
"At our site, we have found that our physicians are far more successful at recruiting patients than study coordinators," he says, citing the 'trust factor' as the key to success. "Patients trust their doctors, so if I tell a patient that he or she will likely do well in a particular study, they're usually willing to participate."
Click Here To Download:•ICON Newsletter — ICON Insight: Enhancing Patient Recruitment: How Sites, Sponsors, And CROs Can Interact More Effectively
