GUEST COLUMNISTS

• What Pistoia Alliance's AI Poll Reveals About Industry Readiness And Regulatory Confidence

  Pistoia Alliance President Becky Upton, Ph.D., reviews findings from a poll about AI use in clinical research conducted at Clinical Trials Technology Congress (CTTC) that revealed barriers to adoption, early ROI, emerging use cases, and the role of patient-generated data.

• Early Patient Education And Community Outreach Are Advancing Representation In Clinical Trials

  Merck Executive Director, Clinical Trial Patient Representation, Adrelia Allen argues that patient awareness, access, early information, and trust shape are the pillars of patient representation in clinical trials.

• The Promise Of Bispecifics In The Quest For Outpatient Immunotherapy

  START San Antonio's Drew Rasco, MD, reflects on the evolution of immunotherapy and highlights how novel therapies such as bispecifics are both challenging and intriguing for principal investigators (PIs).

• Digital Twins Enhance Disease Progression Measurements In FSHD

  Digital twins can transform trial design by making data more robust and alleviating patient burden. In this interview, Epicrispr CEO Amber Salzman, Ph.D., shares how the company's using it to reliably predict muscle volume change in their trial for a FSHD gene therapy. 

• 5 Informed Consent Fixes For Sponsors And Investigators

  Informed consent has never been solely about documentation, but some sponsors has treated it as a checkbox exercise. Here, consultant Tasha Mohseni shares tips and fixs for how best to approach informed consent.

• Navigating The New EU Pharmaceutical Legislation: Key Implications For Pediatric Drug Development

  UCB’s Senior Development Strategy Lead Pediatrics Martine Dehlinger-Kremer, Ph.D., discusses updates to the new EU Pharma legislation and how they impact pediatric drug development, including earlier pediatric investigational plans .

• Why Life Science Tech Pilots Fail After The Demo — And How To Avoid It

  A working demo might look promising, but it doesn't tell you whether the tech can be shipped, integrated, validated, and accepted by regulator. Tech consultant Lukasz Lazewski explains how to look past the allure and evaluate its true functionality.

• The Profit Margin Double Standard That Needs To Change

  We expect pharmaceutical companies to have sizable profit margins, but we collectively scoff at research sites for achieving the same. Maria P. Ladd explores this difference in expectations and why it needs to change for the sake of the industry.