PPD, Inc. has extended its digital clinical trial solutions to support biopharma companies’ research continuity initiatives in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
 
The coronavirus pandemic increases challenges to the design and conduct of clinical studies, particularly the inability of patients to visit research sites. As part of the company’s digital strategy, PPD is collaborating with customers, regulatory authorities and business partners to deploy digital and virtual solutions.
 
New clinical study models are designed to reduce the number of in-person visits in favor of remote and digitally enabled study participation. The company’s service offerings combine direct-to-patient and direct-from-patient models, study drug administration, sample collection and the pickup and return of study materials; and digital solutions such as eConsent, telemedicine, devices/wearables and electronic clinical outcome assessments (eCOA), including electronic patient reported outcomes (ePRO).
 
In response to the impact of COVID-19 on ongoing studies, PPD has collaborated with Medable and Science 37 for virtual trials, and is deploying new mobile applications that enable patients to connect visually with their clinical study sites and allow investigators to better complete safety assessments, plus supporting the capability to also collect eConsent, eCOA or data from devices/wearables on the same digital trial platform. PPD also is deploying trial models that enable or augment, respectively, the use of traditional brick-and-mortar sites with full digital support and decentralized (or virtual) site alternatives to allow the recruitment and retention of patients remotely.