Clinical Trials: Dangers?
Clinical trials are voluntary studies where human participants are needed to find answers to health questions. In these trials, medical interventions, such as drugs and vaccines, are studied to ensure that they are safe; this is done by studying human participants. There are many different reasons for clinical trials including testing if a new treatment is more effective than existing treatments, testing new ways to diagnose a disease, and finding ways to prevent a disease. Even though these trials are safe and help people greatly, many issues must be addressed.
The lack of knowledge of these trials creates a lack of participation. There are misconceptions that the trials are unsafe. People think they are lab rats for doctors and researchers, however, this is untrue. The FDA has strict guidelines to protect the participants and make sure that participants are well-informed before deciding to partake. There are regulations that clinical trials must take before being approved that better help the safety of participants.
The lack of diversity must also be addressed. This is because humans have differences due to race, ethnicity, age, and sex, and therefore, these factors must be accounted for because they can change how people react to the medical intervention being studied. Although diversity is important, there is a lack of diversity in clinical trials, for example, Black Americans who are about 13% of the U.S population make up 5% of clinical trials, and Hispanic and Latino people are about 19% of the U.S population, but only make up 1% of clinical trial participants. There are many reasons for this such as distrust due to past actions in human rights violations in certain minorities, lack of awareness, or lack of access. It is very important to spread knowledge about the benefits of these trials and to diversify the people working in the clinical trials to establish trust in groups who have had negative experiences with the medical field.
Clinical trials are very important to our society and advancements in medicine. Many medicines we use commonly would not be available without these trials. Therefore, the public needs to be informed about the process and know how important it is to find new solutions in medicine.
Written by: Ololade Lawrence
Sources:
Diversity in clinical trials | Pfizer. (n.d.). Pfizer: One of the world's premier biopharmaceutical companies. https://www.pfizer.com/science/clinical-trials/diversity
Basics about clinical trials. (2014, September 12). U.S. Food and Drug Administration. https://www.fda.gov/patients/clinical-trials-what-patients-need-know/basics-about-clinical-trials
Day, J. A. (2022, March 24). Clinical research: What is it? | Johns Hopkins division of gastroenterology and hepatology. Johns Hopkins Medicine, based in Baltimore, Maryland. https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/research/understanding-clinical-trials/clinical-research-what-is-it.html
What are clinical trials and studies? (n.d.). National Institute on Aging. https://www.nia.nih.gov/health/what-are-clinical-trials-and-studies
Clinical trials. (2020, January 17). World Health Organization (WHO). https://www.who.int/health-topics/clinical-trials#tab=tab_1
