Behind the Scenes of Clinical Research
Clinical research provides doctors important information on how to effectively treat patients and is what makes the development of new medicines, procedures, and tools possible. Clinical research allows us to evaluate current treatments, and to determine new treatments that may work better. Research is how doctors find the most effective methods of care for patients.
We wanted to find out more about the people behind this amazing field, so we asked these experienced physicians from our leadership team about their experience conducting clinical research.
What was your initial reason for doing research?
- “Participating in clinical research helps us stay in touch with newer trends and innovations in medicine.”
- “Clinical research brings a certain level of credibility to the practice, and allows for an added level of innovation.”
- “Research can give many patients access to medicine that they may not have had access to otherwise.”
Interested in learning more about late phase clinical trials at DaVita?
Has your perception or motivation changed?
- “For some, the success, advancement, and innovation that they’ve seen as a result of clinical trials has only fueled them to want to do more research. For others, the increased regulations have made it more challenging for them to have the capacity needed to provide proper oversight of clinical studies.”
What was something that you didn’t expect going into research?
- “Properly conducting clinical trials takes more time than you would expect. Every study requires a different system, so you are constantly logging into various places.”
- “The amount of travel required. We have many patients on trials that require us to be in multiple facilities several times per day.”
- “The amount of oversight necessary was an unexpected element of clinical research.“
If you could give a new investigator one piece of advice, what would it be?
- “Make sure that you choose your support system or partner carefully. If you are using an SMO, make sure that they have the necessary resources to support the study and that they understand what level of support the protocol requires.”
- “The investigator needs to be involved in every aspect of research, they cannot simply just be a passive signer.”
Why should a patient participate in research?
- “When patients participate in research, they help contribute to the advancement and development of medicine. The research may not necessarily help them at this point in time, but it may greatly help others in the future who are in the same position.”
If you’re a patient interested in participating in a clinical trial, reach out to MyKidneyResearch.
What is the biggest misconception about research that someone should know?
- “The biggest misconception about clinical research is that someone could participate in research in addition to their regular work without dedicating a significant amount of time to it.”
- “Clinical research requires a certain level of dedication to ensure accuracy, and delegation of this work is not entirely practical as the risk falls on the principal investigator (PI).”
If you’re a physician or researcher and interested in learning more about working with DaVita Clinical Research for your late phase or renal research clinical trial, review our resource library.