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Utility of automated data transfer for cancer clinical trials and considerations for implementation

Published

February 2025

Citation

Pfeffer M, Deneris M, Shelley A, Salcuni P, Altomare I Utility of automated data transfer for cancer clinical trials and considerations for implementation. ESMO Real-World Data and Digital Oncology. 2025. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2949820125000013

Overview

The high data collection demands of cancer clinical trials burden site staff, and manual data entry into electronic data capture (EDC) systems causes inefficiencies, delays, and errors. This labor-intensive process compromises data quality, increases discrepancies, and slows critical reporting timelines, hindering clinical research progress. To address these challenges, implementing software that enables automated transfer of structured data from electronic health records (EHR) to the study's EDC system presents a promising solution.

Building on an ASCO 2024 abstract, in this study, researchers aimed to evaluate the impact of deploying EHR-to-EDC connector, Flatiron Clinical Pipe across multiple multi-center Phase 1 cancer clinical trials, assessing its effectiveness in streamlining study data capture processes. During a 15-month observation period, the tool was used to transfer 11,342 individual data points, representing 955 unique case report form (CRF) submissions, with the average time of 37s for a user to launch, complete, and submit a CRF (range 15-59 secs).

Why this matters

This study confirms that EHR-to-EDC software facilitates automated transfer of a meaningful volume of patient data quickly and efficiently. The findings suggest that widespread adoption could revolutionize clinical trial data management, offering significant time and resource savings. As capabilities evolve to enable automated transfer of even more types of study data, this approach holds promise for further enhancing efficiency and effectiveness in clinical research.

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