Technology that will change clinical research in the next 10 years

Print 04 February 2015
Douglas Bain / CEO at eClinicalHealth Limited

Social media, patient awareness & self assertion and Electronic Health data will all change how clinical research generally, and clinical trials specifically will be carried out over the next 10 years.

Here is a list of predictions on where we will see changes taking place;

1). Cloud solutions - true cloud solutions (often called technically Single Instance / Multi-tenanted systems) will emerge and slowly become dominant. These systems will be natively single sign-on - users will only have one account/one password and they will have access to all studies/all sponsors. Integration will be simplified between systems to the point where integration will be assumed rather than hoped for.

2). Patient Engagement - all clinical trials will have a website.... and patients will be able to become and stay involved via such a website. Take up will be gradual... but then we will see an avalanche of solutions as the evidence demonstrates the value that such involvement can bring both to the patients, and the quality of data that such engagement brings.

3). electronic Informed Consent - closely related to Patient Engagement - we will see both full and partial electronic consenting tools emerge. These will help ensure patients participate from a peer reviewed set of electronic media rich information that provide information in a form that reduces inappropriate recruitment, and avoid excessive early dropouts.

4). Biometrics - Capturing patients biometrics through the life of the study is doubtlessly going to be of significant value in many therapeutic areas. We see this as a key function of our Clinpal solution, focusing more on the management and representation of the correct information - in particular compliance information - to the patient.

5). Electronic Health/Medical Records - An area that has been tackled largely unsuccessfully for sometime. We believe that a solution that puts the patient in control of the sharing or otherwise for clinical research is the way forward. We will be presenting a case study later in 2015 on how we have achieved this in combination with Patient Engagement.

6). Simplification - Stakeholders are crying out for simplicity when running clinical trials. For sites today, the lack of simplicity is most clearly demonstrated by a lack of consistent single-sign-on - multiple passwords per system, even for the same trial. The need to sort that is clear, but the root cause of multiple loosely integrated legacy technologies is often to blame. Bringing patients into the technology environment mandates simplicity. Patients cannot and should not accept multiple systems and passwords.

Clinpal is one of a set of next generation technologies that will help Sites, and in particular patients.

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