Another Milestone In Our Patient-Centric Development 7

The LVJJstudy.com website is a pilot project to improve how we inform patients about clinical trials.

At Lilly COI we spend plenty of time exploring the future of clinical trials. We continue to explore clinical trial matching, Internet-based studies, mobile health in trials, and other possibilities. Though we are excited by these possibilities, we also know that it will take some time for possibilities to fully morph into practicalities. Technologies need to improve, regulatory questions need to be answered, and clinical trial models need to evolve. Meanwhile, patients are in great need of an improved clinical trial experience today. We can’t ask patients to wait on a convergence of ideal conditions, especially when there are feasible improvements that we can make now.

Bringing Clinical Trials To the ePatient 1

hGraph: patient + clinician looking together by Kelly Mansfield is licensed under CC by 2.0

ePatients—patients who are well-informed and empowered by digital technology and see themselves as equal partners with their doctors and healthcare providers—are on their way to becoming more the norm than the exception. For example, according to a recent Pew Research study, 72 percent of Internet users said they had looked up health information in the past year.

Another often-quoted statistic about the current state of clinical trials tells us that only 16 percent of cancer patients surveyed are aware that clinical trials are an option. This could indicate that we are missing opportunities to increase awareness about clinical trials through digital technology and online resources. In a time where 30 percent of trials never get off the ground because they fail to enroll enough patients, we can’t afford to miss these opportunities any longer.  Bringing information about clinical trials to ePatients is important in expanding healthcare options and getting better treatments to the public faster.

Which Clinical Trial Matching Service is Right for You? 6

Photo by DIAC Images

Every day, scientists all over the world are working to discover new and promising treatment options for diseases like Alzheimer’s, Cancer, Diabetes, and Parkinson’s. But, unfortunately, many of those treatments never make it past the testing phase, due to difficulties in finding enough volunteers for clinical trials. According to a recent article in the Sacramento Bee, 85 percent of drug trials face delays because of difficulties attracting and retaining participants.  And, enrollment rates in drug studies have dropped 20 percent since 2000.

The reasons for the drop are unclear. But, for patients who are considering clinical trials as an option, the complexity of finding the right trial and then fully understanding the requirements, risks and benefits almost certainly isn’t helping.

Once a patient does find a clinical trial for which she seems to be a good match, she may find that it just doesn’t fit her needs or lifestyle. Many trial protocols are created solely by sponsors and researchers who may not have taken patient perspectives into consideration. This means that they may have designed a trial with many barriers to entry, such as poor fit to local standards of care, lack of flexibility for the patients in scheduling appointments associated with the trial, and inconvenient locations.

At Lilly COI, we’re working to address the communication and protocol design issues through initiatives like our Clinical Trial Revisualization Design Challenge. And, fortunately, a number of clinical trial matching services have emerged in recent years to help patients find the right trials much more easily.

Telemedicine in the Clinical Trial Space 1

Photo adapted from http://www.acpinternist.org[/caption%5D

We live in a time of rapidly progressing change, with technology transforming industries and directly affecting lives.  One way in which technology is enabling improved healthcare is through telemedicine:

Telemedicine is the use of telecommunication and information technologies in order to provide clinical health care at a distance. It helps eliminate distance barriers and can improve access to medical services that would often not be consistently available in distant rural communities. (Wikipedia)

Historical research has shown the importance telemedicine can play in the healthcare setting. A 2001 pilot study conducted in nursing homes suggested that use of telemedicine decreased the number of visits to the Accidents and Emergency Department  by 9% and decreased the admissions to the acute care hospital setting by 11%. And that’s in 2001!

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