October 2nd 2024
Findings from two Baltimore medical centers presented at the American Society for Radiation Oncology Annual Meeting suggest spiritual themes and distrust may be behind the decline in trial participation.
September 30th 2024
September 25th 2024
September 11th 2024
What Do We Know About Clinical Trials?
September 1st 2004I've recently reviewed many articles on subject recruitment, retention, and attrition in clinical trials. I have found the same three basic research methods: surveys (by telephone and in person), interviews, and focus groups. The information gathered from the three methods include demographics, willingness to participate, problems experienced in clinical trials, motivations for volunteering, health behaviors, social support, benefit expectations, and understanding of the research project. But such strategies collect only the most superficial data, so we don't know nearly as much about the clinical trial experience as we need to know.
Subject Recruitment and Informed Consent
November 2nd 2003One of my articles, published in 2000, opened with this statement: "In some ways, clinical drug research is a service that research participants can choose to buy-or not buy. Some participants (consumers) may benefit from buying a product (a new drug); many researchers (salespeople) will be paid for each subject they recruit."1