Jump-start Study Recruitment: Two Websites to Publicize Clinical Trials
ResearchMatch is an NIH-funded resource created by the CTSA at Vanderbilt University. It connects people who are trying to find research studies with researchers looking for study participants. This free matchmaking service is available to any institution affiliated with the ACTSI. This disease-neutral, Web-based recruitment tool complements existing participant recruitment strategies and includes nearly 22,000 possible research participants.
Researchers may post any human-subject study to ClinicalTrials.gov-even observational studies-to benefit from a megaphone of publicity, all underwritten by the NIH. ClinicalTrials.gov receives 50 million unique visitors a month, and its clinical trial data is regularly fed onto patient advocacy websites and the World Health Organization’s trials database, among others.
The NIH has recently put more marketing muscle behind this database with the launch of a new website-NIH Clinical Research Trials and You-to promote clinical trial awareness and participation. A certain class of interventional studies are required to be listed on ClinicalTrials.gov, and investigators must post these study results on the NIH site within a year after study completion.