Virtual CROs Forecast to be Most Important Clinical Trial Advancement in 2020

With experts claiming that the use of contract research organisations will continue to grow at a rapid rate this year, one CRO specialist is going a step further to predict that virtual CROs will be crowned the most important clinical trial advancement of 2020. Virtual Clinical, which provides services for research teams around the world, believes that the disruptive change that is taking place across the pharma landscape will impact the needs of today’s researchers, resulting in growing demand for virtual and remote solutions.

As clinical trials become more complex, the Virtual Clinical team believes that the quest for efficiency, speed and higher success rates will be increasingly apparent this year as the sector evolves. One of the biggest drivers of change is decentralisation; a modern method that creates new opportunities for globalisation and to work with underrepresented cultures, but also introduces greater complexity in terms of managing sites across different countries and continents. It is this new high level complexity that Virtual Clinical says will see pharma companies make the shift from traditional CROs to virtual support.

Virtual Clinical themselves boast an extensive pool of trusted virtual clinical associates, the majority working on a freelance basis to ensure that clinical teams have access to the right experience, in the right place, at the right time. This enables the contract associates to assist in the efficient setup of phase 2, 3, and 4 global trials, while offering advice on the most beneficial trial setup based on the local landscape, whether that’s virtual, centralised, decentralised, or hybrid trials. Ultimately, the aim is to reduce rising trial costs.

Virtual Clinical CEO Mark Thomas says, “The requirements of today’s research teams are more diverse than ever as a result of ever increasing trial complexity, and what we’ve seen is a pattern of pharmaceutical companies bringing onboard traditional CROs for assistance, only to find that these large organisation are unable to demonstrate the flexibility needed to handle this complexity due to set processes. That’s exactly why we think that virtual CROs will shine brightly this year, with an ability to scale up or down and offer on-demand support, helping teams save money while maintaining control.”

Confident that virtual is the way forward, Virtual Clinical is expanding its services with the introduction of a virtual helpdesk, taking some of the administrative pressure off busy teams. Managed by professional clinical project managers and research associates acting on behalf of the clinical team, the helpdesk is designed to provide protocol support and redirect medical enquiries to experienced experts for efficient and friendly communications.

While the idea of virtual CROs is still a new concept, many teams are being introduced to this way of working during their trials. Many of Virtual Clinical’s clients have discovered the benefits of going virtual after experiencing problems with traditional CROs using outdated processes, tasking Virtual Clinical with rescuing and turning around studies for improved success rates.

To find out more about Virtual Clinical, visit www.virtual-clinical.com