Next Generation Clinical Trials: Embracing Virtual Methods

Abstract

Conventional clinical trials are essential for generating high-quality evidence by measuring the efficacy of interventions in rigorously controlled clinical environments. However, their execution can be expensive and time-consuming. It approximately costs 2-3 billion for the development of a new drug and over two-third of this cost is embedded for clinical testing phases. Clinical trials even struggle to keep participants engaged in the study as nearly 40% of participant's drops out. In addition, clinical trials face several logistical challenges regarding the identification, recruitment, and retention of participants and consistent data collection during trials. This might lead to inefficient resource utilization. To partially address the current problems with conventional clinical trials, there exists the need for an innovation virtual clinical trial (VCT). VCT is relatively a new method of conducting clinical trials, which make full use of technology (machine learning, apps, computer monitoring devices), as well as web platforms (informed consent, counseling, any adverse reaction) allowing the patient to be home based throughout the clinical trial. The first experiments showed close agreement between the clinical and the virtual study, confirming that VCTs can predict changes in performance. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the drawbacks in traditional clinical trials and to promote the process and merits of new innovative virtual clinical trials which have a wide range of advantages in the field of medicine discovery.