Before today, searching for one of more than 71,500 clinical trials in the National Library of Medicine and National Institutes of Health database required a chair, computer, internet connection, and a session on the government’s clinical trials website.
A powerful new iPhone application called ‘Clinical Trials,’ however, gives physicians, health care practitioners and other professionals in the medical industry a way to search for clinical trials from anywhere and at any time.
Using the Clinical Trials app, anyone with an iPhone can tap into the NLM/NIH database and find complete information about registered clinical trials in just seconds.
“Clinical Trials.app adds an extremely powerful tool to the near-empty field of useful medical iPhone apps,” says Geoffrey Young, Chief Technical Officer and founder of StopWatch Media.
“There are over 34,000 apps available for the iPhone, but less than one percent of these have been developed for the professional medical industry. The Clinical Trials application helps contribute to patient care because it can save time, and is a tool designed specifically to address the needs of physicians, patients, and other health care providers,” says Young.
The primary feature of the Clinical Trials app is its advanced search capability. Rather than sorting through a list of broad results from the government database, users can select specific criteria for their search and get a short list of the most relevant trials returned to them.
For example, a physician searching for clinical trials of metastatic breast cancer can filter a search on Clinical Trials.app to return only phase I or phase II trials, observational or interventional trials, and/or trials funded by industry or the NIH, among other criteria.
In the Clinical Trials app, individual search results or entire search queries can be saved or emailed to a friend, colleague or patient. Thanks to another advanced feature, users can even vote on high-impact trials for inclusion in lists of ‘Top Trials’ of the week, month and year.
“If you are a physician and trying to match a patient to a suitable clinical trial, we’ve made it easy to research these trials using just your iPhone. If you are in the health care industry and simply trying to
find every clinical trial of a specific drug or device, this app will save you time,” says Young. “The Clinical Trials application is not about catapulting animals or making burping noises – it adds a tangible service and a useful tool to the world of health care,” he says.
Source: StopWatch Media, USA