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Recruiting patients for drug trials: a difficult task

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

U. Skerritt ,
B. Pitt ,
S. Armstrong  and
A. O'Brien
U. Skerritt*
Affiliation:
Park Royal Centre for Mental Health, Acton Lane, London NW10 7NS
B. Pitt
Affiliation:
Academic Department of Old Age Psychiatry, St Charles' Hospital, London W10 6DZ
A. O'Brien
Affiliation:
Therapeutic Research Unit for the Elderly, Hammersmith Hospital, London
*
∗Correspondence
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Abstract

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In successfully recruiting patients for drug trials in dementia the Therapeutic Research Unit for the Elderly (TRUE) had referrals from various sources. The local Memory Clinic (MC) provided 38 patients for screening of which 31 (81%) were recruited, 75% of the overall number recruited. This number was small (n=41) despite various efforts and does not reflect the time invested and amount of contact work with GPs, out-patient departments and other psychiatric services.

The memory clinic provides a source of recruitment of patients for drug trials as well as services for those who do not qualify for such trials. But recruiting without the aid of a memory clinic is difficult and time-consuming and new approaches must be found.

Type
Original Papers
Information
Psychiatric Bulletin , Volume 20 , Issue 12 , December 1996 , pp. 708 - 710
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
Copyright © 1996 The Royal College of Psychiatrists

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