Current Status and Open Issues Concerning Global Clinical Trials (GCTs) in Japan and East Asia

When global clinical trials are carried out, it is important to consider the influence of racial and ethnic differences on the outcome. From this viewpoint, global clinical trials in East Asia, where racial differences are estimated to be small, are now attracting close attention. Under such circumstances, we conducted a survey using the data registered with ClinicalTrial.gov to investigate the status of participation of East Asian countries in global clinical trials and differences in the regions selected for drug development between Japanese enterprises and non-Japanese enterprises. This survey revealed that about 90% of all global clinical trials and those involving East Asian countries were sponsored by non-Japanese enterprises. Global clinical trials involving only East Asia have been accepted as one of the development strategies by Japanese enterprises, but this strategy has not spread widely among non-Japanese enterprises.