Clinical Trials

Clinical trials are sets of tests in medical research and drug development that generate safety and efficacy data (or more specifically, information about adverse drug reactions and adverse effects of other treatments) for health interventions (e.g., drugs, diagnostics, devices, therapy protocols). Volunteers and patients participating in a clinical trial should not mistaken this as a medical treatment.

A medical treatment has the patient's interests as its main concern. Drugs prescribed and treatment methods adopted is based on the patient's condition. The objective of a medical treatment is to make the patient recover from the illness he/she is suffering from.

A clinical trial is much more strictly regulated. There are protocols to follow and agreement to sign. Once in the trial, withdrawing from it might require the volunteer or patient to compensate the organization holding the trial. Every volunteer and patient will be treated equally without discrimination in order to obtain the most accurate results possible. In other words, a clinical trial does not really consider any individual patient's interest. Its objective is to find out if the new drug works and whether there are any side effects. It is pretty much just doing research on human test subjects. While clinical trials often bring up ethical issues, it is an unavoidable and necessary step to take to improve our future welfare.

Due to the fact that humans are used as test subjects, various tests are done before clinical trials are allowed. However, the new drugs might still have side effects which will cause harm or discomfort to volunteers or patients. As such, instead of curing any patient's illness, a clinical trial is in fact more likely to worsen his/her condition instead. Volunteers and patients need to recognize this danger element of clinical trials and think wisely before subjecting themselves to one.

All in all, patients suffering from illness should not view clinical trials as a last minute treatment, for clinical trials are not meant to treat people. We should all recognize the difference between clinical trials and medical treatment so as to not make any decision we might regret.