How expensive can it be to enroll JUST ONE PATIENT for a Phase III study? As reported by Moe Alsumidaie at Applied Clinical Trials, the cost to enroll a single patient can be as high as $26,000 for a Phase III study. So… Patient recruitment is slow and expensive. That’s now a given. It’s also a given that for each day a new drug or device is not commercialized, millions of dollars are left on the table.
How important are first response times for the success or failure of your patient recruitment programs?
The answer is… FIRST REPONSE TIMES ARE EVERYTHING!!!!
The bottom line is that IF your call center is not connecting with patients in 5 minutes or less, you are throwing out your media spend and your patient recruitment program is at risk for an epic fail.
If anyone ever tells you that patients over the age of 65 are not using the Internet to learn about clinical trials or commercial therapies, please ask them to call or email me. I would love the opportunity to debunk that myth with vast datasets, findings and client results developed during the past ten years. Below is a sample of 5,000 patient inquiries that have been submitted across the PatientEvolution platform. As you will see in the chart, the largest age group (64%) is patients over the age of 65.
I’ll make this quick and valuable.
If you’re ready to learn how Internet technology is evolving from infrastructure (Wave 1) to application (Wave 2) to the “Internet of Everything” (Wave 3), I strongly encourage you to read “The Third Wave” by Steve Case, the former CEO of America Online. For me, this book slams home so many relevant points specific to the much-needed evolution of healthcare. With The Third Wave, Steve Case does so much more than just put thoughts on a page.
Imagine the following scenario… At a routine physical, a Boomer learns she has a heart murmur. The primary care physician refers the patient to a cardiologist. After an echocardiogram, the cardiologist informs her that she has severe mitral valve regurgitation and an enlarged left ventricle. Obviously not good. The cardiologist informs the Boomer that she needs heart valve surgery in the next three months. “Don’t worry,” says the cardiologist, “I know a surgeon who is a ‘magician’ when it comes to valve surgery. He’ll take care of you… no problem.”
