Your Easy Guide to Clinical Studies

A newsletter contains information summarising study progress with the aim to inform participating Site-INV(s), study staff, and if applicable study participants.

 

It is especially useful in Studies:

• With more than one study site
• Last over a long period of time (e.g. several years)
• Recruiting a sizable amount of participants

 

The aim is to motivate, update and train study sites including participants in order to keep the study on everyone’s agenda.

 

A newsletter should:

• Be positive and provide a general outlook on study status
• Respect and maintain data protection issues at all times

 

Newsletters are reviewed and approved by the SP-INV prior to being released.

As a SP-INV, edit a newsletter according to the intended addressee (e.g. participants, experts, age, gender, disease type). Pay special attention to the following aspects:

Language

• Be motivational
• Stick to easy language and abstain from using many technical words
• Include graphs and pictures wherever possible to facilitate understanding, and provide an easy to grasp overview
• If possible, use the participant’s native language

 

Content

• Focus on the most relevant information and do not overload the newsletter - provide information on a need-to-know basis.
• Ask Site-INVs with access to relevant study statistics to provide information on:
  • Overall study progress (e.g. recruitment rate)
  • Emerging new knowledge
  • Experiences of joint interest (e.g. improvement of study processes such as participant recruitment)
  • Required adaptations of administrative tasks

 

Ensure to include acknowledgements, be it study participants, participating study sites, or grant providers