Clinical trials are being made more accessible than ever before thanks to an innovative healthcare blockchain data startup called Patientory, which is partnering with some of the world’s biggest pharmaceutical giants to match patients to the most promising new medical treatments available.
The HIPAA-compliant Patientory platform is working to democratize healthcare data access, empowering patients with full ownership of their medical records. By enabling people to access their medical records and combine them with lifestyle tracking data, Patientory is able to provide insights that help them live healthier lifestyles. Moreover, healthcare organizations get access to a decentralized database of anonymized healthcare records.
Patientory is uniquely able to serve the healthcare industry due to its PTOYMatrix blockchain, which is a distributed ledger that shares access to healthcare information in a secure way. Because it’s decentralized, it enables patients to own their medical data. These individuals are incentivized to share their records securely with healthcare organizations and can earn additional rewards for healthy behavior, which is tracked by Patientory’s consumer app.
Besides giving people a way to monetize their healthcare data, the app also links patients to suitable clinical trials, where they can get early access to new drugs and treatments, earn rewards, and potentially extend their lives.
Patientory’s Vital Role In Clinical Trial Recruitment
Clinical trials are research studies designed to assess the effectiveness of new drugs, surgical and behavioral interventions, and other kinds of medical treatments. They are a key step in the process of determining if a new treatment or medical device is safe and effective for people to use. They also aid researchers as they investigate any potential side effects of new treatments.
Thanks to the leading role Patientory is playing in making healthcare records more accessible, it has emerged as a primary recruiting partner for some of the biggest pharmaceutical companies in the U.S.
Patientory is registered to recruit volunteers for some of the most high-profile clinical studies in recent years. Most significantly, they registered with TrialScope and successfully recruited participants for Phase 3 clinical trials of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine, mRNA-1273. These range of trials were designed to assess the vaccine’s efficacy on a number of different groups. For instance, one of its first studies involved testing COVID-19 vaccines for healthy adults aged 50-75 years, while a second study investigated its effectiveness in healthy children aged between 6 months and 12 years.
Patientory is also registered with Novavax to recruit participants for similar trials for its own COVID-19 vaccine, with those studies focused on its efficacy, immune response and safety in groups of at-risk adults.
Of course, it’s not only COVID-19 vaccine trials that Patientory is registered to recruit for. The startup is registered with multiple pharmaceutical companies on treatments for a wide range of medical conditions, including devastating diseases such as Hodgkin’s Disease, which is a type of cancer that affects the lymphatic system. In this instance, Patientory registered with Seagen to recruit candidates for the highly promising Brentuximab Vedotin (BV) (Part E) treatment, focused on patients with other medical conditions that prevent them from receiving standard chemotherapy treatment.
Another partner is Otsuka, for a study designed to test the efficacy, safety and tolerability of AVP-786 for the treatment of neurobehavioral disinhibition, which is a symptom of traumatic brain injuries and can cause patients to become more aggressive, agitated, and irritable.
Moreover, Patientory registered to recruit participants for a recent clinical trial by Althira Pharma designed to learn more about the impacts of a new, investigational treatment for people with mild to moderate Alzheimer’s Disease.
Ongoing Trials
Patients may be interested to know Patientory is currently recruiting for a number of active clinical trials. For instance, it’s working with EMD Serono to investigate a new treatment for head and neck cancer, while a second study with Rezolute aims to evaluate the study drug RZ402’s effectiveness in treating people with Diabetic Macular Edema.
Dizal Pharma is another notable partner, with Patientory now recruiting individuals for a study that seeks to evaluate DZD9008’s potential for treating people with Non-Small Cell lung cancer with EGFR gene mutations. Finally, Kinnate Biopharma is running an active trial to evaluate the usefulness of its new KIN-2787 drug in patients suffering from BRAF and/or NRAS Mutation Positive Solid Tumors.
Transforming Clinical Studies
The recruitment of volunteers for clinical trials has always been a challenging task for pharmaceutical companies due to the sensitivity of healthcare data. The healthcare industry is one of the most heavily regulated in the world, and the vast majority of patient’s medical records are therefore inaccessible to drug manufacturers. Because of this, pharma companies have traditionally relied on what can only be described as “word of mouth”, asking physicians to help put the word out and find suitable volunteers for their studies.
Patientory’s application architecture is transforming clinical trials by making them more accessible than ever before. Its HIPAA-compliant platform is able to match patients with promising trials in a way that doesn’t compromise patient privacy. What’s more, it also improves the integrity and accuracy of clinical trials, with its tamper-proof nature guaranteeing that all data produced by the trial is accurate and cannot be altered. In this way, Patientory has proven itself to be a highly efficient and secure platform and partner for the targeted enrollment of patients in clinical trials.
Should I Participate?
If you’re thinking of participating in clinical trials, you can download the Patientory app and start sharing your medical data to see which studies you may qualify for. Note that all participants in clinical trials are volunteers.
Although exceptional measures are taken to ensure the safety of all participants, patients should be aware that these are still experimental treatments and there will always be some level of risk involved, as the studies are designed to help researchers learn how they affect people. Before each trial, volunteers will be informed of exactly what they’re getting into, the purpose of the trial, and any dangers they may be exposed to. It’s for this reason that participants will always be required to sign a consent form stating they understand the potential risks.
Depending on the kind of trial, volunteers can be healthy individuals or people afflicted with certain medical conditions or diseases. The reasons why people participate in clinical trials are varied. Some people just want to help advance medical research, while others are looking for new treatment options after the standard treatments failed to improve their health. In some cases, people might see clinical trials as the only way they can access promising and potentially life-saving treatments.
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
Known for identifying cutting edge technologies, he is currently a Co-Founder of a startup and fundraiser for high potential early-stage companies. He is the Head of Research for Allocations for deep technology investments and an Angel Investor at Space Angels.
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