The Covid-19 epidemic created significant logistical issues that trial sponsors had to deal with and address quickly in the previous year, causing a sea change in the clinical trials business. Now that the dust has settled, pharmaceutical firms are confronted with a market that looks quite different from the one they were used to, yet trends they were previously aware of continue to increase in size and prominence.
Increase in Vaccine Trials
One of the most pressing global health issues of the last year sparked a race among many pharmaceutical and biotech companies to create a vaccine that may protect against SARS-CoV-2. Over 180 coronavirus vaccines are under preclinical testing, according to the WHO’s Covid-19 Candidate Vaccine Landscape and Tracker. Demand for vaccine trials will continue to be significant. As a result of many vaccination studies, enrollment and start-up times are affected.
Disruptions to Clinical Trials
There have been problems with clinical trials in the past. When there was a substantial risk of spreading the disease, clinical studies were forced to suspend enrollment. GlobalData’s Pharma Intelligence Center stated in March 2021 that the Covid-19 epidemic had disrupted more than 1,200 clinical studies worldwide. There were also supply chain issues, including logistical issues related to the provision and transportation of biological samples and supplementary materials for clinical studies, in addition to the point of delayed timeframes.
Increase in Remote Trials in a Flash
The conventional clinical trial supply chain saw a dramatic shift as it rapidly adopted the remote trial paradigm. With the help of service providers like Oximio, direct-to-patient techniques solved the logistical issues of distant trials.Clinical trial sponsors can more readily reach a worldwide audience with decentralized studies. Even the most remote locations where patients are situated are included in this. Despite the potential benefits of a more diverse patient population, sponsors must contend with issues related to dynamic customs rules and the shifting tax and regulatory requirements for each region.
Patients should take personalized medicine.
Medical genetic profiling is at the heart of personalized medicine, which aims at identifying a treatment that is best suited for each patient by looking at their genetic data. Health care might be transformed by this new trend, which would lead to more tailored studies with higher success rates. For participants, this means that they are more likely to receive effective therapy and do not cause any adverse side effects. On the other hand, sponsors benefit from reduced abandonment rates and more cost-effective studies. Trials focus on a small population of patients and have a considerably smaller number of participants.
Expansion of Access to and Monitoring after the Trial
Patients afflicted with severe, life-threatening diseases who are not participating in clinical trials but have no other treatment options can receive experimental therapies through extended access programs. Increasing post-trial duties for sponsors has led to increased demand for post-trial monitoring services.
What are you waiting for? Sign up for our Clinical Trial Management certificate program today. It is designed to meet the demands of the industrial market.