Innovation and public accountability in clinical research

For more than 20 years, clinical researchers have expressed alarm about the decline of their field, but they have failed to achieve a consensus on policies to revitalize and sustain it. Although they have traced the plight of clinical research to profound changes in science, medicine, and public expectations, their conservative vision and preference for short-term measures inhibit effective policy formulation. These trends are the outcome of historical developments, and they seem to mandate a new approach to public policy. A potential source for more viable and socially accountable policies lies in practitioners' notion that clinical research bridges basic and applied science (by translating scientific innovations into practical measures). Exploiting that idea, however, would require a major reorientation of the field toward health services research and the institutions that are struggling to support it.