#23 Assessing safety in clinical trials – Marianne Lunzer & Sanja Prpić
Medicines safety monitoring is a continuous process that begins with pre-marketing clinical trials and continues with post-marketing studies to fill any gaps in knowledge. With Marianne Lunzer from AGES and Sanja Prpić from HALMED, we review the pros and cons of various study types and the importance of testing medicines on diverse populations.Tune in to find out:How pre- and post-approval safety studies are connectedWhy safety assessors can request studies in underrepresented populationsHow new regulations are impacting safety assessments in the EUWant to know more?This review in Trials summarises the methodological challenges of assessing drug safety in clinical trials, while this study in Clinical and Translational Science reviews how sex, racial, and ethnic diversity in clinical trials have changed in recent years. Post-authorisation safety studies can be imposed or voluntary and can be carried out as clinical trials or as non-interventional studies. Read about the differences on the European Medicines Agency’s website.Large simple trials can control for biases in observational research while still providing results that are generalisable to real-world use. This review in Drug Safety explains why.The new Clinical Trials Regulation harmonises how EU trials are assessed and supervised for increased safety and transparency. As part of these efforts, the SAFE CT project aims to facilitate clinical trial coordination and safety assessments in the EU.For more on clinical trials, revisit this conversation with Peter Doshi on restoring invisible and abandoned trials.This episode is the last of a three-part series on sources of evidence in pharmacovigilance. Listen to the first two episodes here:The evidence for signalsUnlocking the power of real-world dataJoin the conversation on social mediaFollow us on X, LinkedIn, or Facebook and share your thoughts about the show with the hashtag #DrugSafetyMatters.Got a story to share?We’re always looking for new content and interesting people to interview. If you have a great idea for a show, get in touch!About UMCRead more about Uppsala Monitoring Centre and how we work to advance medicines safety.