PAREXEL Advances Patient-Centric Drug Development With Introduction of its Patient Innovation Center

PAREXEL International Corporation, a leading innovator of global biopharmaceutical services, today announced the launch of its Patient Innovation Center, designed to help guide sponsors in their efforts to improve efficiency and success across all areas of biopharmaceutical development including clinical trial design, recruitment, execution and market access.  With a patient-centric approach, the Center can help sponsors improve the drug development process by reducing the practical, financial and geographical barriers patients and caregivers often face, and optimize patient involvement and engagement.

Simplifying the patient journey with a focus on the patient’s needs and experience has been proven to enhance the drug development and commercialization process.  A report recently released by The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) and commissioned by PAREXEL found that patient-centric trials took almost half the time to recruit participants and that drugs developed using these approaches were 19% more likely to be launched.  However, patient-centric designs were only utilized in 5.2% of Phase II and III trials across the industry. In the commercialization phase, a patient-centric approach can enhance the process as well.  With the Patient Innovation Center, PAREXEL will help facilitate sponsors’ ability to develop comprehensive strategies for patient-centric drug development and commercialization and leverage new approaches including Patient-Centric Protocol Optimization, virtual (or at-home) trials and direct-with-patient studies.

“While the evidence is clear that patient-centric approaches can improve the development process, many sponsors remain in need of a roadmap to effectively apply these strategies over time,” said Sy Pretorius, MD, Senior Vice President, Medical & Scientific Services, PAREXEL. “At PAREXEL we are committed to designing trials with patients in mind. Through the Patient Innovation Center, we aim to bring the full breadth of our services, expertise and innovation to clients to help more-effectively implement these approaches, reducing the barriers and optimizing patient involvement throughout the drug development and commercialization journey.”

PAREXEL’s Patient Innovation Center services include:

Study Planning: PAREXEL’s Patient-Centric Protocol Optimization service proactively involves patients and PAREXEL Site Alliance expert nurses in the protocol-design process to identify and address potential practical challenges to study participation. By maintaining focus on patients’ needs and augmenting the feasibility process, patient burden can be reduced and the experience for participants optimized.  By using a combination of web listening, patient, caregiver and site staff input, PAREXEL can help sponsors positively impact study recruitment and retention.

Study Implementation: PAREXEL’s patient-centric focus can help ensure a pragmatic approach to study implementation to reduce patient burden, including the deployment of virtual trials.  It includes elements such as online recruitment, eConsent, home nursing, direct-to-patient drug shipments, patient apps and video dosing to enhance patient experience and compliance.  PAREXEL’s Patient Sensor Solution service is focused on continuous data collection through the use of wearables to remotely capture, transmit and store data in a secure platform powered by PAREXEL’s Perceptive^® Cloud.  Deployment of the virtual trials service brings the research to patients and their caregivers, reducing the practical, financial and geographical barriers to clinical study participation for patients and their families.

Patient & Market Access: PAREXEL’s commitment to encompassing the patient’s needs and experience extends throughout the product development lifecycle – and is critically focused on ensuring patient access to important therapies.  In preparing for and supporting product commercialization, PAREXEL aims to deliver research that reflects patients’ true care path and experience – and that will ultimately support the key clinician, payer, and regulatory decisions that will drive patient access.  PAREXEL’s approach leverages technologies and processes to collect patient-specific data via mobile sensors and applications, patient-reported outcomes surveys, direct-to-patient studies and other strategies – all informed by a deep understanding of the patient care path, and the market’s clinical and payer evidence requirements.

“In today’s drug development landscape, it is more important than ever that we as an industry place the patient’s needs at the core of everything we do,” said Peyton Howell, Chief Commercial and Strategy Officer, PAREXEL.  “At PAREXEL, we understand how critical patient involvement and engagement are to successful clinical development and, ultimately, access to therapies.  As we look to the future, we will continue to seek new ways to optimize the patient experience as we partner with our clients to develop and deliver important new medicines.”

PAREXEL International Corporation is a leading innovator of global biopharmaceutical services.  We simplify our clients’ journey of transforming scientific discoveries into new medical treatments for patients with high-quality Phase I-IV clinical research, regulatory, consulting and market access services.  PAREXEL develops breakthrough innovations and solutions by leveraging its comprehensive therapeutic, technical and functional expertise, in more than 100 countries around the world. For more information, visit www.PAREXEL.com.