Showing Respect for All the Stakeholders in the Patient Recruitment Process

Respect for the other stakeholders in the field of patient recruitment is based on recognizing that everyone is fundamentally trying to do the best they can.

There is often a finger pointing game that takes place of sponsors blaming CROs and sites for not doing what they say they will, and sites blaming sponsors for too strict eligibility criteria or CROs for not paying them on time, and CROs blaming sites and sponsors for not giving them enough support, or patient recruitment companies being blamed for not delivering on their promises, or even patients potentially being blamed for not being willing to take part.

When really we should all recognize that funding, planning, operations, dealing with participants, giving of one’s own time and physiology etc. are all essential factors in getting patient recruitment and retention to work, such that we can help clinical trials to fulfill their purpose of testing potential new treatments.

The Core Value of Respect Should run Through all Your Patient Recruitment Activities

In the final 3 short vids I’ll be doing this year before taking a break, I want to mention the core value that everyone involved in clinical trials should keep at the heart of everything they do.

Respect.

Respect for trial participants, respect for the other stakeholders, respect for the process, respect for the industry, and respect for the disease or condition.

Keeping respect for participant lifestyles in mind when designing trials should help reduce some of the excessive burden elements that are often incorporated in plans for such things as site visits.

Similarly, research sites acting with respect for participants may go above and beyond the minimum for making patients feel welcome. Potentially even tailoring their opening hours around participants’ availability.

And the industry as a whole can maybe consider using more respectful language than the word ‘subject’ – which, while obviously technically correct, is only one step away from ‘guinea pig’.

Offering Patients Choices that Fit Better with their Lifestyle may be a Good Idea

Most clinical trials have a series of procedures in place that are simply imposed on the participants regarding when and how they take part.

For sure there are good reasons behind this. And having patients attend research sites is the only suitable method of monitoring them for certain types of trials.

But I wonder what would happen if we could offer patients a choice of, say, which day they attend the site, or if it would be possible to attend out of normal office hours.

Taking this a step further, it would be interesting to see the results from providing the option to have some monitoring visits in their own home, or even at their local doctor’s office.

I’m not suggesting this would magically solve all the problems of patient recruitment and retention. But it certainly seems that offering people choices that fit into their lifestyle would be a good thing to consider.

Using Omnichannel Marketing Techniques for Patient Recruitment

The word omnichannel is often used in the context of marketing. Essentially it means that an organization or brand is being promoted through multiple methods, with each one retaining a consistency of messaging and appearance.

If we look at an omnichannel approach to patient recruitment, we might be talking about digital outreach, doctor outreach, community outreach, liaising with patient groups, utilizing lab test or claims data, and traditional advertising methods such as radio and press ads.

For our purposes the consistency of messaging and appearance may not be quite so important as for an organization that wishes to promote its brand for wider recognition.

Certainly we should retain the same colors and name of the study, and if there are messages we know are effective we should utilize them.

But the key to omnichannel for patient recruitment is to promote your trial using as many methods as make sense.

Associating a Random Object with a Current Project can Help with Idea Generation

One technique that can offer spark some interesting ideas is to look at associating a random object with something you’re currently working on.

For example, in front of me I have a phone charger, so I would attempt to define how a phone charger is similar to choosing Christmas presents – which is a task I’m currently working through.

Now, obviously, you could say that a spare phone charger as a Christmas gift is a pretty decent start, but what I’m getting at is to go deeper into the possible associations – however fanciful or seemingly bizarre.

Phone chargers are nowadays designed to be compact, and for the type of phone I use it’s always a USB-C end that plugs into the phone.

Which could make me think – OK, what sort of thing would be a good fit for each person I’m buying a gift for.

So maybe a small gift that fits well is the idea I should adopt.

Writing and Reading Everyday are Recommended for Improving Writing Skills

There’s a couple of things I think are helpful when it comes to improving and keeping on top of writing – learned from my own experience as well as advice I’ve picked up from others.

Write every day is one I haven’t always followed, but know that when I do there’s a kind of muscle memory effect that kicks in such that the process of writing becomes easier the more consistently it’s carried out.

Reading every day is another good habit.

From the moment we do learn to read there’s unlikely to be many days go by where we don’t do some kind of reading – food packaging, TV listings, WhatsApp messages etc.

But what I find really works is to read books, newspapers and magazines – both fiction and non-fiction – to gain a better understanding of what works and what doesn’t, as well as simply gaining more knowledge.

Writing and reading are things I recommend doing every day.

A Condition-Specific Website Could be Beneficial for Patient Recruitment

Following on from the idea of having a trial-specific website, I’m often bemused by the fact that sponsor organizations and CROs don’t seem inclined to have websites that are focused on specific therapy areas – which could act as an information hub and provide a means for building up a database of potential trial participants.

There are clearly plenty of good information-based websites developed by patient groups and charities, so I’m not suggesting a duplication of these.

But if there was a website that featured information relevant to people with particular conditions, that helped them understand the science behind the potential new treatments and the process of trial participation, it could surely prove valuable for patient recruitment and retention.

Not least through allowing people to register their interest in taking part in trials, such that when a suitable one is developed, there’s already a list of willing potential participants available to reach out to.

Patient Recruitment Works Better with a Trial-Specific Website

Despite this being 2023, nearly 2024 now, I still see plenty of clinical trials that don’t utilize the internet for recruiting patients.

Certainly there are people who don’t go online all that much, and there are other methods that can be used to reach people that are not digital in nature.

But the overwhelming majority of people we’re likely to want to get our message in front of will be able to be reached through the internet.

Having a trial-specific website is an obvious method for being able to present information that allows potential trial participants to make up their mind about whether to apply.

You can expand on this by including condition-specific information to back up what you’re saying about your trial.

And even create a section of the website aimed at healthcare professionals, which can obviously go into more depth and include more medical terminology.

Your recruitment efforts will work better with a trial-specific website.

More About the Learning Phase for Facebook Ads

There are some things you can do to help your Facebook Ad Sets exit the Learning Phase and start performing the best they can.

One of these is to target a wider audience within your Ad Set. For example, if you have age range as a factor in your targeting, splitting the ages into too many Ad Sets may hinder their chances of achieving the 50 goals in 7 days. (Each Ad Set will need to achieve this to exit the Learning Phase).

Another tactic would be to change the goal. It’s far easier to achieve 50 landing page views in a week than it is to achieve 50 conversions – especially if your budget is not all that high.

The downside with that approach, of course, is landing page views do not guarantee pre-screener form fills, so Facebook may send a lot of traffic, but not generate all that many referrals.

An Overview of the Learning Phase for Facebook Ads

I was discussing the optimization of Facebook ads with a sponsor contact recently, and it occurred to me that there are some Facebook-specific elements that are perhaps not all that well understood.

One of these is what Facebook calls the Learning Phase. This is the period once you first put an Ad Set live in which the algorithm is learning what works best for achieving your conversion goals.

It takes around 50 goals to be achieved over a week for Facebook to have learned enough to move forward in an optimal manner – these goals likely being defined as a lead being generated when someone submits a pre-screener form for a clinical trial.

The reason the Learning Phase is important is your ads won’t perform as well as they could be if they remain in this phase – i.e. if you don’t achieve 50 goals in a 7 day period. I’ll discuss this further in the next vid.