Institute urges overhaul of US cancer trials network

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BlankPublished 21 April 2010, doi:10.1136/bmj.c2142

Cite this as: BMJ 2010;340:c2142

Institute urges overhaul of US cancer trials network

Bob Roehr

1 Washington, DC

The large Clinical Trials ative Group Program sponsored by the US National

Cancer Institute has become " inefficient and cumbersome, " says a report from the

Institute of Medicine. It needs to be " redesigned to improve value by reducing

redundancy and improving effectiveness and efficacy of trials, " it says.

The cooperative group programme involves more than 3100 institutions, 14 000

investigators, and 25 000 patients in clinical trials each year. But it takes

two years to plan and initiate a new trial; only about half are ever completed;

and funding has fallen by 20% since 2002.

These changes have occurred while basic science has yielded an avalanche of

insights into genomic and molecular mechanisms of disease (see News, BMJ

2010;340:c2149, doi:10.1136/bmj.c2149). The report says that " a robust, standing

cancer clinical trials network is essential to effectively translate discoveries

into clinical benefits for patients. "

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