A Dublin-based tech start-up has announced the launch of Wirano – a digital platform for the rapid and effective organisation of clinical trials. The platform aims to revolutionise the activities involved in clinical trials by accelerating start-up of trials, optimizing patient recruitment, and improving site and investigator selection processes.
“The enormous cost of clinical trials in terms of time, money and effort is well known. The average clinical trial process lasts between 7.5 and 12 years with costs ranging from US$161M - US$2.6B per drug. Yet in spite of this investment, the success rate of clinical trials is just 14% (1),” said Noel Quinn, Commercial Director. “Wirano aims to improve this rate of success by optimising the patient recruitment process, improving site selection procedures and creating reliable channels for effective communications between all participants.”
One of the major challenges is searching for and selecting patients for trials – which is why 50% of all planned trials do not achieve recruitment targets on time. In fact, up to 11% of all trials do not recruit a single patient. In addition, the organisers of clinical trials often find it difficult to select a research center with reliable data on previous experience and patient enrollment. The lack of a single database of centers from different countries and the absence of effective and reliable communication channels with research teams further aggravate the situation. Wirano is designed to allow all participants of clinical trials, including pharmaceutical companies, medical researchers, and patients to effectively communicate throughout the process.
Wirano will significantly optimizs the process as pharmaceutical companies (sponsors) will be able to quickly select research teams in different countries, doctors will be able to quickly post information about clinical trials for patients and start recruiting, and patients will have the possibility of finding a suitable clinical trial in a matter of minutes and apply for participation in it.
