By Andrés Escallón, VP eCOA Practice
Participating in a clinical trial is no walk in the park. Day in and day out, patients grapple with substantial barriers making the trial experience even more difficult than regularly managing their health conditions. These challenges can include traveling long distances to trial sites, having limited information about the trial, time constraints, and more. On top of that, the clinical trial technologies aimed to help simplify the process can paradoxically add to these hurdles.
To avoid additional burdens from technology and create a better patient experience, one approach is to take cues from consumer technology, which obsesses the user experience. Most successful consumer technology ecosystems effectively connect a range of devices and platforms to create a seamless user experience. When applied to clinical trials, this can translate to empowering patients with access to crucial trial information and options to do certain parts of a trial, such as completing assessments and reporting health conditions, from home rather than the clinic. Most importantly, it can create an atmosphere where patients feel comfortable and confident, where their trial journey—from initial recruitment to its conclusion—is as smooth as possible.
Embracing patient-centered technology
Designing technology centered around improving the patient experience, simplifying their engagement in trials, and streamlining site and sponsor workflows is more than a nice to have - it is essential to supporting the future of clinical trials. Technologies such as eConsent, eCOA, IRT with direct-to-patient (DtP) drug shipments, telehealth, wearables, and remote monitoring tools can all help create a comprehensive tech ecosystem that elevates the overall patient experience.
The successful clinical trial technology ecosystem efficiently manages and establishes a cohesive patient journey. A unified platform where technology systems that span the entire patient journey work together seamlessly can be an essential part of a successful ecosystem. With a powerful technology infrastructure, the Suvoda Platform brings together eConsent, IRT, and eCOA to create an intuitive, user-friendly, and collaborative experience for patients and site teams.
A brighter future
While certain barriers persist throughout the trial lifecycle, embracing user-friendly technology that encompasses the entire patient journey can be a powerful facilitator to help patients participate, stay engaged, and feel supported throughout the trial.
Author
Andrés Escallón
VP eCOA Practice
Suvoda