- Email: [email protected]
She dies me a death when she swings
DISSECTING ROOM
Where to find clinical trials on the web Canadian HIV Trials Network http://www.hivnet.ubc.ca CancerNet http://cancernet.nci.nih.gov CenterWatch http://www.centerwatch.com Epilepsy Foundation http://www.efa.org Internet Grateful Med http://igm.nlm.nih.gov Rare Diseases Registry http://rarediseases.info.nih.gov/ord
he worldwide web is increasingly being used to recruit patients into clinical trials, a process facilitated by online enrolment forms, e-mail, and the ability to reach large numbers of potential participants from a single website. Patients seeking to enroll in trials, and physicians eager to refer them, can also use the web to rapidly pinpoint appropriate trials in diverse geographical regions. One excellent resource for this purpose is CenterWatch, which boasts an organised compendium of active trials, mostly in the USA and Canada, in a wide range of therapeutic areas. Protocol summaries, eligibility and exclusion criteria, and contacts for more than 5000 ongoing, institutional review board approved trials in cardiology and vascular medicine, obstetrics and gynaecology, immunology and infectious diseases,
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and other specialties are posted on the site, along with research centre and provider profiles, industry news, and information on new drug approvals. A secure e-mail system is used to notify patients of new trials in their area of interest. Two sites from the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) have strong international components, though their therapeutic scope is more limited. At CancerNet, one can access the Clinical Trials Registry from PDQ, the US National Cancer Institute’s comprehensive cancer database which lists more than 1500 active cancer trials worldwide. A recent search yielded, for example, 172 UK trials, 102 in France, 93 in Germany, and two in India. The NIH’s Rare Diseases Registry of ongoing and planned trials can be searched by category— connective tissue, genetic and dysmorphic, neonatal, and so forth. A
recent random search at this site yielded 33 trials in the UK, nine in Spain, 24 in France, 22 in Switzerland, and three in Egypt. Both sites also contain vast amounts of data from completed trials, disease-related statistics, and educational materials for investigators, health professionals, and patients. Description of new and ongoing HIV/AIDS trials worldwide can be accessed from the US National Library of Medicine’s AIDSTRIALS database, searchable for free with Internet Grateful Med. The Canadian HIV Trials Network website lists active trials throughout Canada. Another way to learn about trials in specific diseases is to search the websites of advocacy organisations; for example, the Epilepsy Foundation uses the web to recruit for its international gene discovery project. For local trials, try the websites of nearby university and research centres, many of which post protocol summaries of trials involving local clinicians and investigators (see also Lancet 1997; 350: 1454). Marilynn Larkin [email protected]
She dies me a death when she swings Returning to her glassy eyes mourning uncertain deaths, slipped discs, friends with freshly discovered lumps, her wanderings to and from the sexless bed, I hear her say, “I sleep in the daytime, no good; no good.” Returning to her song before words I wonder have I saved myself swelling a continent to her concerns. at fifty times her large-bosomed but thin-waisted size I feel her in my dreams. Lines cut across and under and straight through her eyes, she would twist my second-guesses with surprise recoveries, each one “a new lease on Life”, though the glistening hooks of her depressions still catch me.
Ron Charach Ontario, Toronto, Canada
1140
Glimmer Emma Hedgecoe
THE LANCET • Vol 351 • April 11, 1998
Where to find clinical trials on the web Canadian HIV Trials Network http://www.hivnet.ubc.ca CancerNet http://cancernet.nci.nih.gov CenterWatch http://www.centerwatch.com Epilepsy Foundation http://www.efa.org Internet Grateful Med http://igm.nlm.nih.gov Rare Diseases Registry http://rarediseases.info.nih.gov/ord
he worldwide web is increasingly being used to recruit patients into clinical trials, a process facilitated by online enrolment forms, e-mail, and the ability to reach large numbers of potential participants from a single website. Patients seeking to enroll in trials, and physicians eager to refer them, can also use the web to rapidly pinpoint appropriate trials in diverse geographical regions. One excellent resource for this purpose is CenterWatch, which boasts an organised compendium of active trials, mostly in the USA and Canada, in a wide range of therapeutic areas. Protocol summaries, eligibility and exclusion criteria, and contacts for more than 5000 ongoing, institutional review board approved trials in cardiology and vascular medicine, obstetrics and gynaecology, immunology and infectious diseases,
T
and other specialties are posted on the site, along with research centre and provider profiles, industry news, and information on new drug approvals. A secure e-mail system is used to notify patients of new trials in their area of interest. Two sites from the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) have strong international components, though their therapeutic scope is more limited. At CancerNet, one can access the Clinical Trials Registry from PDQ, the US National Cancer Institute’s comprehensive cancer database which lists more than 1500 active cancer trials worldwide. A recent search yielded, for example, 172 UK trials, 102 in France, 93 in Germany, and two in India. The NIH’s Rare Diseases Registry of ongoing and planned trials can be searched by category— connective tissue, genetic and dysmorphic, neonatal, and so forth. A
recent random search at this site yielded 33 trials in the UK, nine in Spain, 24 in France, 22 in Switzerland, and three in Egypt. Both sites also contain vast amounts of data from completed trials, disease-related statistics, and educational materials for investigators, health professionals, and patients. Description of new and ongoing HIV/AIDS trials worldwide can be accessed from the US National Library of Medicine’s AIDSTRIALS database, searchable for free with Internet Grateful Med. The Canadian HIV Trials Network website lists active trials throughout Canada. Another way to learn about trials in specific diseases is to search the websites of advocacy organisations; for example, the Epilepsy Foundation uses the web to recruit for its international gene discovery project. For local trials, try the websites of nearby university and research centres, many of which post protocol summaries of trials involving local clinicians and investigators (see also Lancet 1997; 350: 1454). Marilynn Larkin [email protected]
She dies me a death when she swings Returning to her glassy eyes mourning uncertain deaths, slipped discs, friends with freshly discovered lumps, her wanderings to and from the sexless bed, I hear her say, “I sleep in the daytime, no good; no good.” Returning to her song before words I wonder have I saved myself swelling a continent to her concerns. at fifty times her large-bosomed but thin-waisted size I feel her in my dreams. Lines cut across and under and straight through her eyes, she would twist my second-guesses with surprise recoveries, each one “a new lease on Life”, though the glistening hooks of her depressions still catch me.
Ron Charach Ontario, Toronto, Canada
1140
Glimmer Emma Hedgecoe
THE LANCET • Vol 351 • April 11, 1998