In a recent video interview with Applied Clinical Trials, Jimmy Bechtel, vice president, site engagement, SCRS, discussed key challenges and initiatives at the site-level. AI’s impact on sites is significant, with uncertainty around its implementation. Diversity requirements pose challenges, and technology overload is a major issue due to inconsistent tech stacks and financial burdens on sites. Bechtel also highlighted some initiatives that SCRS is currently working on and gave an overview of the most recent Global Site Solutions Summit.
A transcript of Bechtel’s conversation with ACT can be found below.
ACT: The Global Site Solutions Summit was just in September. Could you tell us about some of the most relevant themes that emerged and your key takeaways?
Bechtel: That’s such a great event because it is our global summit. It covers a variety of different topics. Nothing is off the table when it comes to that one. We have other events like the Oncology and the IncluDE and West where we talk about narrowing in on specific niche topics. There’s a lot of really great data, global-level data that’s shared around the state of the industry as it is most important to and pertains to sites, a lot of what sites need to know to continue to benchmark themselves and be really ready for the future. Where are trials? Where are you? How are you faring against your peers? What is the outlook for the industry? Ken Getz shared some really, really interesting data on Sunday at that conference around where we’re headed as an industry, what trials are happening? We found that there’s a need for sites and patients to meet the demand that we’re going to have for clinical trials, a lot of complicated, just sheer amount and the specialization that is going to be required for some of these protocols is really increasing Seeing at an alarming rate, while the data that SCRS shared showed that, financially, sites are still struggling, struggling to keep their doors open. It paints a really important picture for us to understand. Some might consider it grim, given the juxtaposition of where we’re headed with trials and where we are with the state of things with research sites, but it’s important for us to understand that so we can address it, tackle it, and realize if we don’t do something as an industry to address some of the challenges that the sites have and support them financially so that they can keep their doors open, we’re not going to be able to meet the needs that this industry has when it comes to the conduct and execution of some of these really complicated and lengthy clinical trials.