- Posted By: Bethan Copsey
On 16-17th November 2015, Sue Dutton & I traveled to Glasgow for the 3rd International Clinical Trials Methodology Conference. There was a packed programme with over 600 delegates, around 100 oral presentations and over 200 posters. The attendees mainly consisted of chief investigators, statisticians, methodologists and trial managers.
A wide variety of topics were covered during the oral presentations including:
• Systematic reviews
• Recruitment and retention
• Patient and public involvement
• Health economics
• Pilot studies
• Statistical analysis
• Trials in stratified medicine
• Health economics
• IT systems in trials
Many of the talks discussed solutions to practical issues for specific clinical trials and there were lots of interesting ideas which could be applied to current and future trials. The workshops were accessible and engaging and provided a more informal setting which encouraged more interaction with the audience. Sue's earlier blog describes the talks on studies within a trial (SWATs).
A selection of useful pieces of information to take away:
- ‘Good participatory practice guidelines for biomedical HIV prevention trials’, which could be applied to a more general context which provide guidance on engaging with stakeholders in the design and conduct of trials
http://www.unaids.org/sites/default/files/media_asset/JC1853_GPP_Guideli...
- The use of podcasts and plain language summaries for the dissemination of systematic reviews (and the use of PPI groups to develop these)
- The use of an internal review process for data sharing requests
- The use of the PRECIS-2 tool in trial design to ensure your trial is conducted in line with the trial’s aim (explanatory or pragmatic)
https://crs.dundee.ac.uk/precis
The next International Clinical Trials Methodology Conference will be held in Liverpool on 7-10th May 2017, in collaboration with the Society for Clinical Trials. I found the conference incredibly useful and I would encourage people working in all areas of trials to attend.