A Phase II clinical trial was underway to test a drug for pancreatic cancer. The sponsor’s overall goal was to recruit 99 patients across 10 sites. nRollmed was brought on after the trial had been active for some time but was stalled due to slow recruitment. nRollmed’s recruitment services were added to 6 of the sites. The inclusion/exclusion criteria were stringent, which added to the usual challenge of recruitment. One especially challenging criterion was that the patients needed to have been chemo naive, which meant that they needed to be recruited within 2 weeks following their diagnosis. There were also many other clinical trials for pancreatic cancer taking place simultaneously at some of the sites, generating competition for qualified patients. Another main challenge was sadly the short life expectancy of the patients. The average life expectancy was about 3 months, meaning that there was a short period of time to recruit a patient into the trial.
