Result dissemination from clinical trials conducted at German university medical centers was delayed and incomplete
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Susanne Wieschowski1, Nico Riedel2, Katharina Wollmann3
1Institute for Ethics, History, and Philosophy of Medicine, Hannover Medical School, Hannover, Germany.
Objectives:
Timely and comprehensive reporting of clinical trial results builds the backbone of evidence-based medicine and responsible research. The proportion of timely disseminated trial results can inform alternative national and international benchmarking of university medical centers (UMCs).
Study Design And Setting:
For all German UMCs, we tracked all registered trials completed between 2009 and 2013. The results and an interactive website benchmark German UMCs regarding their performance in result dissemination.
Results:
We identified and tracked 2,132 clinical trials. For 1,509 trials, one of the German UMCs took the academic lead. Of these 1,509 "lead trials," 39% published their results (mostly via journal publications) in a timely manner (<24 months after completion). More than 6 years after study completion, 26% of all eligible lead trials still had not disseminated results.
Conclusion:
Despite substantial attention from many stakeholders to the topic, there is still a strong delay or even absence of result dissemination for many trials. German UMCs have several opportunities to improve this situation. Further research should evaluate whether and how a transparent benchmarking of UMC performance in result dissemination helps to increase value and reduce waste in medical research.
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