Jennifer Lawyer
Comment Now! Enhancing the Diversity of ...

6/25/2019

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The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) released a draft guidance “Enhancing the Diversity of Clinical Trial Populations - Eligibility Criteria, Enrollment Practices, and Trial Designs”. It is the position of the FDA to enroll subjects who are the target audience for the investigational product once approved. Certain populations are underrepresented in clinical trials, even though they are part of the target audience. The draft guidance outlines methods the sponsor can use to support more diverse enrollment that more accurately reflects the target population, in accordance with requirements in the FDA Reauthorization Act of 2017 (FDARA).

Jennifer Lawyer
Introducing the DIGR-ACT® Solution! Part 5

6/20/2019

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What does ‘A’ stand for?

Don't waste time on root cause analysis, at least not if you won’t use the results! Proper root cause analysis takes effort and resources, and you need to use the output to determine actions to try to stop the issue recurring. This is the ‘A’ step of the DIGR-ACT® solution. Having dug into the issue, you now need to ‘Act’ on what you found.

Jennifer Lawyer
ICH Releases E8 “General Considerations for ...

6/11/2019

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Clinical trials have become increasingly complex since the ICH E8 guideline on “General Considerations for Clinical Trials” was finalized in 1997. The draft revision is in Step 2b and available for public comment, and there are some interesting changes to note. Specifically, there is a greater emphasis on patient centricity, design of trials with quality in mind, and risk management. The overlying theme is fit-for-purpose quality as an essential consideration for study design. The revision is part of the Good Clinical Practice (GCP) Renovation initiative. Previously, the ICH E6 GCP R2 addendum was finalized in 2016.

Jennifer Lawyer
Introducing the DIGR-ACT® Solution! Part 4

6/04/2019

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What does ‘R’ stand for?

We're all in a rush, and we want to fix issues quickly. But often, by assuming too much, we might reach the wrong conclusion. The cause that we used root cause analysis tools to discover is actually incorrect. Once we have the (wrong) cause(s), we may rush off and take action to fix it. But if it's the wrong cause, it is wasted effort and you rushed - only to go slow. Like if your taxi doesn't show, you might decide never to use that company again because they are unreliable - when the real problem was that you gave them the wrong pick-up address.

Jennifer Lawyer
Highlights from the Critical Thinking Webinar!

5/29/2019

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Did you miss the free live webinar on “Critical Thinking and Clinical Research – A Better Way”? Some key highlights of the training were:

  • What is critical thinking? To learn more about the seven critical thinking skills and how they relate to clinical research, sign up to view the recorded webinar here. DIGR-ACT® was built to support all of these.

  • Root Cause Analysis: There are many tools to find root cause, but they often lead down the wrong path, yielding inconsistent and ineffective results. For example, asking 5 Whys can result in different root cause depending on how the questions are asked, and what about other relevant questions such as who, what, where, when, and how?

FDA

Comment Now! Enhancing the Diversity of Clinical Trial Populations (Draft Guidance)

6/25/2019

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The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) released a draft guidance “Enhancing the Diversity of Clinical Trial Populations - Eligibility Criteria, Enrollment Practices, and Trial Designs”. It is the position of the FDA to enroll subjects who are the target audience for the investigational product once approved. Certain populations are underrepresented in clinical trials, even though they are part of the target audience. The draft guidance outlines methods the sponsor can use to support more diverse enrollment that more accurately reflects the target population, in accordance with requirements in the FDA Reauthorization Act of 2017 (FDARA).

Comment Now! Rare Disease: Natural History Studies for Drug Development (FDA Draft Guidance)

4/11/2019

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The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has released a draft guidance, “Rare Diseases: Natural History Studies for Drug Development”. We discussed another draft guidance released in January, “Rare Diseases: Common Issues in Drug Development” in our blog. The new draft guidance describes how natural history studies may be best used for drug development for rare diseases.

New Draft Q&A Guidance on RBM Released: Comment Now!

3/21/2019

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The Food and Drug Administration released a new draft guidance, “A Risk-Based Approach to Monitoring of Clinical Investigations: Questions and Answers Guidance for Industry”. The purpose of the guidance is to provide additional clarification to the finalized Risk Based Monitoring (RBM) guidance from 2013. Questions and answers provide details about:

Rare Diseases: Comment Period Now Open for Revised Draft (Update)

2/12/2019

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The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has revised the draft guidance, “Rare Diseases: Common Issues in Drug Development Guidance for Industry”. The original draft guidance was issued August 2015. The revised draft guidance was published in the Federal Register February 1, 2019. Our previous blog mentioned that although it was available for public review January 16, there was a delay in publication and comment availability.

Rare Diseases: Comment Period Open Soon for Revised Draft

1/22/2019

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has revised the draft guidance, “Rare Diseases: Common Issues in Drug Development Guidance for Industry”. The original draft guidance was issued August 2015. The revised draft guidance is offered as an advance notice and will be published in the Federal Register at a later date.