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Facilitating Clinical Trials
On this episode I caught up with Josh Mann, Co-founder/President of a non-profit organization, shareforcures.com, a digital platform that is facilitating clinical trials. The platform accomplishes this by creating a database that enables individuals to contribute various aspects of their personal health data that can be utilized by clinical trials.
We know securing test participants is one of the greatest challenges and sources of cost for clinical trials. So to have resources such as this becoming available should help tackle that problem as more and more patients and individuals populate the database with ever more information.
Data can come from wearable tech such as FitBits, Apple Watch, and others, as well as diagnostic equipment like glucometers, blood pressure, and even electronic medical records. The individuals contributing data have the ability to make as much or as little of their information accessible by clinical trials. And when it is utilized, it is possible to de-identify the individual to protect their privacy.
Josh talked about the fact that currently, most clinical trials end up with participants who as a group are often not truly representative of the patients who will be utilizing a medicine or device. The reason for this stems from the fact that typically, patients taking multiple medications are often not included, along with patients who have multiple diseases, or other factors that can contribute to effectiveness of a drug or treatment regimen.
Josh will be participating in the discussions at the Health Connect South event September 21, 2016 at the Georgia Aquarium, talking about the role of big data in healthcare and how its evolution and integration will impact patient outcomes and clinical trials. Be sure to use the promo code “RadioX” when you go to register for the event. And make sure your contacts know about our promotion for Radio X listeners!
