Why volunteer in clinical trials? Here’s a summary of the reasons why clinical trials are important
Clinical trials are research studies that use human participants to help evaluate new medical treatments, drugs, or devices. They are an essential tool that helps lead to new and improved discoveries within patient care, the biotech and pharmaceutical industry, medical science, and the health system. Here are some reasons why clinical trials are significant:
1. When you volunteer, there are many benefits that you may receive for your participation.
You may be asking yourself, why participate in a clinical trial? As a volunteer, you not only play an active role in the advancement of medical science, you also gain access to new treatments before they are widely available to the general public. Thus, you benefit from the medical care you receive when volunteering in a clinical trial. In doing so, you are also helping in the process of creating new (and possible better) treatments and devices for many others.
2. They bring new treatments to the market.
Clinical trials rigorously test new medicines, vaccines, diagnostics, and devices to ensure that they are safe and effective for the general public. Without these trials, advances based on scientific evidence would not occur in science and medicine.
3. They play a significant role in the advancement of medical knowledge.
In medicine and medical research, there are many hypotheses and observations. However, they need to turn those into innovations and new treatments for the patients. Clinical trials play a critical role because they are considered the gold standard because of their rigorous framework, which allows researchers to gather evidence and data about the effectiveness of new medical interventions. It is also within clinical research that people gain more information about the disease/condition in question. Through trials, errors, and success, the data that emerges leads to advancements in medical science.
4. The results can play a significant role in advancing patient care.
The results of clinical trials can affect thousands and millions of lives. The innovations and data that emerge from these clinical research trials are crucial because they pave the way for new technology, treatments, and diagnostics to develop for diseases and conditions. They also allow the clinical community to compare different standards when the results are not clear on which standard of care is better than the other. When results don’t always lead to new treatments, the data still steers towards advancements in knowledge (and how to improve patient care).
It permits researchers to address what methods are better.
Overall, your participation is crucial because, without volunteers, we wouldn’t be able to conduct clinical trials. Without clinical trials, we would not be able to develop new/improved treatments or medical devices. Clinical trials are also critical to the health system because lots of money goes into this area. It is imperative that the health system pays for outcomes based on evidence, not just intuition. While they are not the end solution to all the problems within the medical world, they are part of a larger system working towards making breakthrough innovations and better patient care. You can help by taking an active role in volunteering for clinical trials in your area!
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