Addressing Gaps in DCTs to Meet Patients’ Needs
How Scout Clinical, Bezyl®, Inc, and uMotif, identify and meet patients’ needs within DCTs.
Since 2020 and the start of the pandemic, sponsors and CROs have accelerated the number of decentralized and hybrid clinical trials. DCTs open previously hard-to-access doors to clinical trial participation for patients, while simultaneously removing burdens associated with traditional clinical trials. Now, in 2022, looking back on all that has changed in the last two years, Scout Clinical is asking the questions, “What’s missing for patients in DCTs? How can we keep patients and participants at the forefront of clinical trials?" If we minimize in-clinic requirements, how do we, then, keep the human aspect of care in clinical research?
Scout Clinical joined partners Bezyl and uMotif in a conversation revolving around how each company is protecting patients and their caregivers, families, and loved ones, from being lost behind the logistical requirements of clinical research.
Scout, Bezyl and uMotif each have unique, “boots on the ground” perspectives of clinical trials, and each company is focused on the patient experience by way of their own individualized scope of services. Scout partners with sites, sponsors, and CROs to alleviate burden through a broad set of patient services, including patient payment and travel coordination. Bezyl, founded by Esther Howard after the death of a close friend, creates a space for patients to more easily ask for help from their friends, family, and caregivers through a personalized app that promotes mental health. And uMotif, a patient-first eClinical cloud-based platform, allows patients to record their eCOA and ePRO results in an atmosphere specifically tailored to the patient journey.
When Scout supports a clinical trial, the focus is simplifying the process for the patient by meeting their personal needs. Recognizing that joining a clinical trial oftentimes puts patients in a setting they are unfamiliar and inexperienced with, while also disrupting their daily routines, jobs, and financial stability, is key to their approach. Scout understands that even though DCTs help patients from a logistical standpoint, keeping trials cost-neutral is still a large concern for current and potential patients. Scout uses a cloud-based portal, that is one of many apps patients use during the course of a clinical trial, to make access to services simple for patients. In addition to this, to simplify all the requirements on the patient, Scout employs a team of Patient Navigators to walk with patients through participation in the trial. The Patient Navigator helps educate the patient in what can be, and often is, an overwhelming setting. Patient Navigators help patients not only understand and utilize various apps, but also navigate financial, geographic, emotional, and cultural barriers. By working to alleviate these barriers Scout makes it easier for patients to stick with it.
For Esther Howard, and the team at Bezyl, directly addressing patients’ and their caregivers’ mental health is a foundational, but often overlooked, patient need. When Esther’s own close friend was diagnosed with colon cancer, she saw first-hand how difficult it was for her friend to ask for help from those around her. It was also apparent to Esther the impact this lack of communication had on not only her friend’s mental health, but also on her friend’s loved ones and caregivers. Building on this experience, Esther created Bezyl. The Bezyl app allows patients to ask for help based on suggestions from others who have been there before and offers caregivers insight and training to support their loved one through their time of illness. The app allows patients to create spheres of support built around various groups of people in their lives. Patients can then submit a request to any sphere, which helps eliminate anxiety related to deciding who to go to for help. It also allows patients to track their moods on a day-by-day basis which gives them more awareness of their own mental wellbeing. By addressing the anxiety centered around asking for help, Bezyl helps patients build their mental strength and keeps the patient experience at the forefront of clinical trials.
uMotif's ethos has always been about driving a patient-first mindset in developing eCOA/ePRO software solutions, and they started by understanding the burdens that trial participation puts on patients. Through a detailed patient journey mapping approach, designed in collaboration with patients, uMotif has enhanced the value of the study, making it more engaging for patients. By taking a similar approach to the evolution of DCT, uMotif believes the industry could likewise enhance the value of trials to patients. Post pandemic, the industry runs the risk of overly focusing on the DCT’s technical delivery mechanism, rather than starting with patients first and designing thoughtful solutions around the needs of the people involved in research. A patient-first design means thinking carefully about what type of trial participation experience patients really want; considering what will meaningfully reduce their burden versus what we think will reduce their burden. A patient-centered journey approach means we can predict, react to, and deliver on these fundamental desires for meaningful person-to-person contact regardless of location. uMotif keeps patients at the forefront by designing their platform to real, communicated patient needs rather than to assumed patient needs. By implementing this approach of designing clinical trials with and for the humans involved - patients, site staff, CRAs and sponsors - DCTs can enhance their value to the patient, leading to higher engagement and better trials.
DCTs remove significant logistical barriers for patients, which has in turn made clinical trials more accessible to a larger patient population, and in the last two years, since the start of the pandemic, we’ve seen exceptional growth in DCTs. But Scout Clinical, Bezyl, and uMotif, are still working to improve the patient experience within clinical trials, decentralized or otherwise. Whether it’s providing patient education and services, creating a space for patients to easily ask for help, or even taking an in-depth look to determine if the trial is set up to truly reduce patient burden or if it is instead built upon industry presuppositions, there’s still room within the DCT space for better support of patients and their caregivers.
About Scout Clinical: Scout Clinical is part of the Meeting Protocol Worldwide family of brands and has over 25 years of global experience in the life sciences industry. Scout’s mission is to be regarded as the best clinical trial patient travel and reimbursement company in the world. Scout offers a customizable scope of patient services tailored to fit the needs of individual studies. A team of dedicated patient liaisons working in tandem with the Scout Portal, a cloud-based web app, makes it easier for patients to stick with it. Learn more at www.scoutclinical.com.
About Bezyl: Bezyl is the only global, digital mental health company that provides a simplified communication platform to help people help each other improve their mental strength. Asking for help is easier using Bezyl's proprietary technology that directly connects individuals to their designated spheres of support. Learn how the app works at bezyl.com.
About uMotif: uMotif’s mission is to put patients at the center of clinical research. Designed with patients for patients, the uMotif patient-first eClinical cloud native platform powers site-based to fully decentralized clinical, real-world, and post-marketing research. By engaging patients and healthcare professionals, uMotif is trusted by global pharmaceutical companies, biotechs, CROs, and academic institutions to capture large volumes of eCOA/ePRO, symptom, and wearable device data. www.umotif.com
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