The Human Subject

Bernadette Tosti, Chief Product Office for ProofPilot, draws on her long wealth of clinical research experience to discuss best practices to validate new digital tools for decentralized clinical trials.

Bernadette Tosti, Chief Product Office for ProofPilot, draws on her long wealth of clinical research experience to discuss best practices to validate new digital tools for decentralized clinical trials. She also shares with co-hosts Nelia Padilla and Jefferson Smith the future questions about clinical research that she beleives need to be answered.

Dr. Isaac Rodriguez-Chavez is a pioneer in the field of clinical research. He joins the podcast to explain how important the twin concepts of digitization and customization are for designers of decentralized clinical trials--providing necessary tools is as important as responding to the needs of the patient. Dr. Rodriguez-Chavez also addresses challenging questions about the future of clinical research.

Paul Rude from Fierce Strategy + Creative discusses health care leadership strategies, the revolutionary impact of patient-owned health information, and the need to meet patients where they're at to recruit for clinical research. (35 minutes)

Paul Rude from Fierce Strategy + Creative discusses health care leadership strategies, the revolutionary impact of patient-owned health information, and the need to meet patients where they're at to recruit for clinical research.

Sylvia Baedorf Kassis, Program Manager at the Multi-Regional Clinical Trials of Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard, discusses her experience optimizing clinical research and how innovations in other sectors can be applied to the clinical research process.

Sylvia Baedorf Kassis, Program Manager at the Multi-Regional Clinical Trials of Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard, discusses her experience optimizing clinical research and how innovations in other sectors can be applied to the clinical research process.

Dr. Nita Vengeepuram from Mt. Sinai School of Medicine's Institute for Health Equity Research provides insights as to how increased community engagement and participation improves clinical research.

Dr. Nita Vangeepuran is the Co-Director of Community Engagement at Mt. Sinai School of Medicine's Institute of Health Equity Research. She discusses the importance of why expanding community involvement with clinical research is not only important to secure funding but also have improved and targeted results. Dr. Vangeepuran also shares her thoughts on the future of clinical research, including personalized medicine and data-gathering.

Lisa Hepner, director / producer of "The Human Trial" documentary, discusses her film and shares what she learned about the struggles faced by clinical trail participants and by drug companies seeking to raise the necessary funds for a successful clinical trail.

"The Human Trial" is a documentary that follows clinical trial participants as they assist in a cure for diabetes. Producer and director Lisa Hepner discusses her interest in capturing the clinical research process on film, including the struggles faced by both the participants and also by drug manufacturing company ViaCyte to secure the necessary funding to complete the research.

Dr. Irfan Khan emphasizes the need to maximize the research patient experience as the last great opportunity to accelerate the current system of drug development.

Dr. Irfan Khan explains how clinical research start-ups that adopt a patient centric approach are able to quickly scale up and find success.

Dr. Irfan Khan explains Circuit Clinical's patient voice and patient insight approach, increasing engagement with patients to provide feedback on their health care experience--and how this approach should be applied to clinical research.

Patient centricity means putting the patient first in an open and sustained engagement in clinical research. Dr. Irfan Khan, Founder and CEO of Circuit Clinical, explains why patients in the health care system should be viewed as consumers and should be provided the best experience possible, improving the clinical research experience.

Dr. Irfan Khan is the founder and CEO of Circuit Clinical, one of the largest research organizations in the United States. In this discussion, Dr. Khan discusses the necessary steps to create a complex research ecosystem that maximizes patient centrcity and increases trust and transparency for participants in clinical research.

Conclusion of the conversation with Dr. Barbara Bierer, who explains how responsible vendors and designers of clinical research overcome intrinsic bias to include participants from under-represented populations, including participants with disabilities or from non English-speaking communities.

Continuation of the discussion with Dr. Barbara Bierer, who explains the social justice imperative of increasing access to clinical research.

As the Faculty Director of the Multi-Regional Clinical Trails Center at Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical Center, Dr. Barbara Bierer discusses practical solutions to increasing access to clinical research.

As both the Director of Regulatory Ethics at Harvard's Clinical and Translational Science Center and the Faculty Director of the Multi-Regional Clinical Trials Center at Brigham and Women's Hospital at Harvard Medical School, Dr. Barbara Bierer "lives and breathes" equity and inclusion in clinical research. She joins the podcast to discuss how increasing patient access and opportunities is a necessary feature when designing and implementing clinical research. 

In the final episode for the first season of the Human Subject, co-hosts Eric and Jeff Smith reflect on the guests, topics, and surprises over the course of the initial season. Also included: clinical research-related jokes! Plus a special appearance by Season Two's co-host Nelia Padilla, who offers a preview of what to expect in future Human Subject episodes.

Eric and Jeff are joined by Lindsay Chandler, Clinical Research Supervisor at Providence Cancer Institute, to revisit audio recorded prior to wide release of the COVID-19 vaccine. Did their predictions come true? What circumstances occurred to change their mind regarding the vaccine? Also discussed: why Russia's vaccination rates are so low despite the country being first to develop a vaccine.

Recorded live from the 2021 Portland Clinical Research Professional Virtual Conference, keynote speaker Ken Getz joins Jeff and Eric to discuss his thoughts on the future of clinical research after COVID, taking questions both live and via Zoom chat from conference attendees.

Rochelle Williams-Belizaire, Assistant Director of Research Collaborations in Precision Oncology at the Knight Cancer Institute discusses the importance of patient advocates in clinical research, steps currently underway to increase diversity &  inclusion, and explains her metaphor about how personalized medicine would be similar to bringing your car in for a tune-up.

Melanoma researcher Pam Cassidy from Oregon Health & Sciences University discusses her fascination with the antioxidant selenocysteine, "the twenty-first amino acid," how her background in chemistry makes her concerned about the COVID variants, and the interface where research transitions from preclinical work to human trials.

Ken Getz, Tufts Research Professor and Founder of CISCRP, discusses the emergence of patient-centered research, why non-successful studies need to be funded, and his hope that COVID leads to increased collaborations in clinical research.

Molly Downhour and Nicole Mills offer insight from their national expertise in designing novel strategies for recruitment, training, and retention of clinical research staff.

As the leader of the Northwest Association for Biomedical Research, Ken Gordon provides a treetop view about clinical research. In this episode, Ken gives insight into how clinical research will be conducted post-COVID.

In the premiere episode of The Human Subject, co-hosts Eric Smith and Jeff Smith address the pressing question: Why a podcast about the future of clinical research?