Bringing a new treatment to patients depends on reliable clinical trial data. But behind every data point is a patient balancing study participation with the realities of everyday life.
For sponsors, recruiting patients is only part of the challenge. Keeping them engaged throughout a study can be just as important.
Long journeys to research sites, time away from work, childcare responsibilities, unexpected expenses and complex reimbursement processes can all make participation more difficult. In some studies, patients and their families may even need to temporarily relocate to another city or country to access treatment.
Individually, these challenges may seem logistical. Collectively, they can become significant barriers to patient retention and successful trial delivery.
Why patient retention matters
When a patient leaves a clinical trial early, the impact extends beyond the individual study journey.
Dropout can contribute to missing data, increase pressure on recruitment and sites, extend timelines and ultimately increase the cost and complexity of bringing new treatments to market.
This makes patient retention more than an engagement metric. It is an important part of trial performance.
Understanding why patients struggle to remain in studies requires looking beyond the protocol itself and considering the practical realities of participation.
Making clinical trials easier to participate in
Effective patient support starts by identifying and removing those practical barriers.
Travel and accommodation can be coordinated around the patient’s circumstances. Payments and reimbursements can reduce the financial burden of participation. Decentralized clinical services can bring appropriate elements of a study directly to the patient. Dedicated patient coordinators can provide a consistent point of contact throughout what may be a long and complicated journey.
The appropriate model will vary between studies and patient populations. The objective, however, remains the same: make it easier for patients to participate without compromising the requirements of the trial.
This is particularly important in rare disease and complex studies, where patients may travel significant distances to specialist sites, depend on caregivers or require long-term support.
There is no data without people
In our recent Business Reporter feature, mdgroup Founder & CEO Miriam Dervan and Chief Commercial Officer LaQuinta Jernigan discuss the relationship between patient experience, retention and successful clinical trial delivery.
They explore the practical challenges patients can face during clinical research, why those challenges matter for sponsors and how the right support can help reduce barriers to continued participation.
Watch the video to hear their perspectives on putting patients at the center of clinical trial delivery.
> Read the original Business Reporter feature: There is no data without people
Bringing the trial closer to the patient
Decentralized Clinical Services can reduce the number of journeys a patient needs to make by delivering appropriate study activities in the home or another convenient location.
This does not necessarily mean choosing between a traditional site-based study and a fully decentralized trial.
A hybrid approach can allow sponsors to determine which activities need to take place at the research site and which can safely and effectively happen closer to the patient.
When combined with coordinated Patient Travel, Patient Payments and personalized Patient Coordination, this creates a more flexible model built around both protocol requirements and patients’ lives.
Patient support in practice
Removing practical barriers can make a measurable difference to the patient experience and study delivery.
Across mdgroup-supported studies, patients have received coordinated travel, relocation, payments and in-home clinical services across countries and continents while maintaining critical study visits.
In one Phase I/II rare disease gene therapy study, mdgroup supported patients traveling internationally to specialist research sites, including relocations of up to nine months and in-home clinical visits. Despite the complexity of the study, zero patient visits were missed.
> See how we supported patients throughout the study
For sponsors running rare disease, complex or geographically dispersed studies, this kind of coordinated support can help make demanding protocols more manageable for the people taking part.
Supporting patients throughout the clinical trial journey
At mdgroup, we support patients throughout clinical trials with services designed to make participation easier and help sponsors deliver successful studies.
From Patient Travel, Patient Payments and Patient Coordination to Decentralized Clinical Services, Clinical Staffing and Clinical Logistics, our teams work across studies and geographies to provide support tailored to the needs of patients and protocols.
Because when patients are better supported, trials are better positioned to succeed.
Supported patients. Successful trials.
> Speak to our team about patient support for your next clinical trial
