Clinical Trials
Today, medicine relies almost exclusively on randomized controlled trials and their more sophisticated cousins, meta-analyses, to guide treatment decisions - Barron H. Lerner MD
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CLINICAL TRIALS: Should you, Could you, Will you?
Did you know, depending upon where you look for the information, a mere 3-5% of cancer patients participate in clinical trials? Let's look at the flip side. More than 90% of us may be walking around with answers locked inside our bodies which begs the question: "WHY?"
The truth is, there's no one simple answer. It's complicated. There is room for much improvement in every aspect of the process. A quick search on clinicaltrials.gov shows there are currently almost sixteen thousand trials across all diseases being studied that are currently recruiting, or are nearly ready to begin to recruit patients.
There's the first problem. How can any one doctor or office be expected…
Resources
Many Breast Cancer Patients Can Safely Skip Chemo, Large Trial Confirms
A large study confirms that many patients with early-stage breast cancer don’t need chemotherapy after surgery. The TAILORx trial evaluated a pathology test called OncotypeDx (Genomics Health), which predicts risk of recurrence, and found the test to be reliable.
The latest discovery in breast cancer treatment is a win for research that puts patients, not drugs, first
The New England Journal of Medicine recently published a study that’s made waves in the medical community. The trial assessed the usefulness of chemotherapy for a specific, common variant of breast cancer, and found that thousands of women may not actually need to undergo the intensive, painful treatment as part of their cancer-fighting regimen. The finding will likely benefit patients and their families, and the healthcare systems that look after them.
Thousands of women will avoid chemo thanks to a study funded by the breast cancer stamp
Many breast cancer patients don’t need chemo, a precision medicine study just found.
Clinical Trials and Breast Cancer
The bottom line is that those who participate in clinical trials not only receive a treatment that is currently not available anywhere else but also will hopefully be the answer that they need when they find that all other current options have been exhausted.
Clinical Trials: More Trials, Fewer Tribulations
Clinical studies that group patients according to their molecular profile can make for better and faster drug approval decisions.
Do Clinical Trials Work?
The rules that govern study enrollment end up creating trial populations that invariably are much younger, have fewer health complications and have been exposed to far less medical treatment than those who are likely to use the drug. Roughly 53 percent of new cancer diagnoses, for example, are in people 65 or older, but this age group accounts for just 33 percent of participants in cancer drug trials.
How Clinical Trials Saved Women With Breast Cancer From Disfiguring Surgery
Today, medicine relies almost exclusively on randomized controlled trials and their more sophisticated cousins, meta-analyses, to guide treatment decisions. Bernard Fisher’s story reminds us of the consequences patients faced in a time before such trials were the gold standard.
Too many mice are sacrificed for seriously flawed studies
The road to getting a new pharmaceutical drug on the market is long and brutal. It begins with a novel compound that must first be tested in cells and then animals. This "pre-clinical" phase of drug development, which can last for several years, allows researchers to understand how potential therapies might work on different diseases and whether the drugs are likely to be safe or toxic in people. But for every 5,000 compounds assessed at this stage, only about five are promising enough to even try in humans. And after the clinical trials in humans, only one will actually reach pharmacy shelves. This overwhelming rate of failure here is often attributed to the fact that mice and cells are poor substitutes for people. But it increasingly looks like that gap may be caused by something else entirely: the quality of animal and cell studies.
CLINICAL TRIALS: Should you, Could you, Will you?
Did you know, depending upon where you look for the information, a mere 3-5% of cancer patients participate in clinical trials? Let's look at the flip side. More than 90% of us may be walking around with answers locked inside our bodies which begs the question: "WHY?"
CenterWatch
A listing of Breast Cancer medical research trials actively recruiting patient volunteers. Search for closest city to find more detailed information on a research study in your area.
ClinicalConnection
By bringing both of our clients (Study Participants and Clinical Investigators) together we are able to revolutionize the Study Participant recruitment process in order to make it quicker, more accurate, and more personal than ever.
ClinicalResearch.com
Quintiles created ClinicalResearch.com to increase clinical research awareness, understanding and participation. Here you can find clinical research studies recruiting in your area and learn about advances in medical areas of interest to you.
ClinicalTrials.gov
ClinicalTrials.gov is a Web-based resource that provides patients, their family members, health care professionals, researchers, and the public with easy access to information on publicly and privately supported clinical studies on a wide range of diseases and conditions.
ResearchMatch
ResearchMatch has a simple goal — to bring together two groups of people who are looking for one another: (1) people who are trying to find research studies, and (2) researchers who are looking for people to participate in their studies. It is a free and secure registry that has been developed by major academic institutions across the country who want to involve you in the mission of helping today’s studies make a real difference for everyone’s health in the future.
Trials
Trials is an open access, peer-reviewed, online journal that encompasses all aspects of the performance and findings of randomized controlled trials.
Trials Central
Trials Central is a comprehensive online resource guide for trusted information about medical research studies, also called clinical research trials. The site helps to find a free, confidential program that assists the patients, their families and health care workers, to look for clinical case studies, which are most appropriate to a patient's medical and personal situation.
BreastCancer.org
Today, fewer than 5% of breast cancer patients receive treatment for their disease in a clinical trial. Why? One factor is that information about current trials and how to enroll in a trial are often not well understood.
Susan G. Komen
All clinical trials have specific criteria for joining the study, so you may not be eligible for a trial. Or, there may not be a clinical trial currently recruiting participants that’s right for you.
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