The Delaware Health Information Network or DHIN signs a master service agreement with a leading clinical trial site organization.
The agreement with Hightower Clinical will bring more clinical trials to Delaware as well as generate new treatment options and boost the drug and diagnostic development process.
This is the first time that Hightower will conduct clinical trials in Delaware.
According to DHIN, there are limited options to participate in clinical trials locally, as they generally take place at Delaware’s large medical centers. This agreement opens the door for more types of clinical trials to take place at more locations in the First State.
"So it could be something as simple as just finding a protocol, DHIN doing the data search and then contacting those physicians, or it can be the whole thing, you know, Hightower can train staff there at the physician's office on how to oversee a clinical trial, how to do those patient interactions. They can train a PI, so a principal investigator, who's really in charge of patient safety and running a study properly at a physician's office," said Emily Hubbard, the senior manager for clinical trial research at DHIN.
The agreement will also help reduce time and costs typically involved in finding trial participants.
"The greatest benefit is access to these clinical trials,” said Hubbard. “A lot of times people think that clinical trials are, oh gosh, you know, ‘I'm end stage, I've got nowhere else to go.’ That's not all clinical trials. So a lot of times there are options that are low cost, no cost that are available that our residents may not know about. So there may be treatments available, they're just not aware of them."
Hubbard notes this agreement doesn’t affect DHIN’s relationships with large medical centers in the state.
