A Wake-Up Call for Pharma Sponsors and CROs: Are Your Site Portals Doing More Harm Than Good?

The burden of technology in clinical trials is staggering, with clinical research sites struggling to manage the tech stack required by their sponsor partners. A Society for Clinical Research Sites survey of clinical trial sites revealed that 84% of respondents used three or more CTMS platforms, with 25% using five or more¹. In another recent survey, 60% of sites polled reported using a total of at least 20 different systems daily. This burden is only increasing as the number of "e" tools proliferate.

To address this issue, the industry created portals that consolidated links to study technologies. However, it's become apparent that these solutions, sometimes known as site, study, technology, or single sign-on portals, may not adequately meet the needs of research sites.

This blog explores why traditional portals fall short and how innovative and emerging technologies can provide a universal solution to benefit sponsors, CROs, and research sites alike.

Why legacy site technology portals are failing research sites

Although designed with good intentions, sponsor portals fall short in addressing the needs of research sites. The portals are often used for a single trial, leaving research site staff to navigate multiple portals that are tied to individual trials. This makes it challenging to gain a comprehensive view of all the technologies needed for their studies.

Kira Harris, Clinical Research Manager at the Ohio Sleep Medicine Institute, says having a unique portal for every trial makes it all too easy for the site to disregard since they're not frequently used.

“We get these tools and they're great, but then we can only use them for that one trial,” says Harris. “Then we have another one for a different trial. When you have one for every trial and they're all different, we forget that they exist because we don't use them all that often.”

This scenario plays out at many sites, where poor adoption rates prevent the portals from becoming an integral part of the staff’s daily workflow. The missed opportunity for creating a more “sticky” solution not only impacts trial efficiency and quality short term but also hinders much sought-after collaboration and communication that can be enabled when a platform becomes an essential standard across all sites running a study. 

Andrew Kimball, Chief Commercial Officer at Meridian Research (Now part of Velocity Clinical Research), thinks conventional site portals are tackling the sponsor's challenges, but not necessarily those of the sites who use them. "I think they're solving the problem for themselves, which then they believe solves the problem for the folks that are downstream,” he says. 

Kimball also weighed in on their usability shortcomings. “I just don't think the execution on the end-user portion of it has been there yet." This lack of execution makes it difficult for site staff to use them efficiently.

Lisa Bjornestad, VP of Clinical Operations and Growth at DM Clinical, believes traditional site portals fail to meet the needs of research sites due to their development process. She agrees that legacy solutions are not meeting the requirements of sites and shares her own experience with a popular portal platform. Bjornestad suggests that these solutions were likely designed without input from sites, even though they had good intentions.

“It doesn't really work for anybody else,” Bjornestad said. “I just think it was designed in a bubble. I'm sure it does exactly what they wanted it to do. It just doesn't do exactly what everybody else wanted it to do, too.”

Kimball expressed optimism that a universal portal solution could eventually be developed. "I think we're hopeful someone will pull it under one umbrella and make it nice and smooth so that the sites do have that single resource to be able to go to be quicker and more efficient in their day-to-day activities," he added.

The benefits of a universal portal solution 

By contrast, a universal portal solution like VersaTrial takes a different approach that prioritizes the needs of research sites above all else.

VersaTrial empowers site teams to organize and collaborate on study-specific technology bookmarks and key contacts, enabling all the information they need to run a study accurately and on time to be readily available. Additionally, it includes a built-in password management system, which helps to reduce the need to add more software to an already crowded technology stack. 

Site staff welcome the extra time each day to focus on data entry, quality checks, and spending more time with study participants.

“The time that we're saving, we invest in making sure we don't make mistakes,” says Jovanessa Alcantara, a Study Coordinator from ALSA Research. “So we literally take the time that we would have taken before to be a little more meticulous, because it gives us that space, even an extra 2 to 3 minutes. We can look over documents a third or fourth time to make sure they're correct.” 

An additional 2-3 minutes per task may seem insignificant, but when multiplied across all the people at a site and beyond, the impact to the study timeline is substantial. 

The stickiness factor of a universal portal cannot be overstated. As it becomes embedded in the site's daily workflow, it unlocks measurable value across the entire research cycle. As an example, VersaTrial automatically informs all stakeholders of staffing changes, such as a new CRA or research coordinator, and any new technologies being used for the study. This is important to avoid miscommunication, frustration, and delays that can arise when important information is not communicated effectively. 

Consider that once a site portal becomes an essential part of the staff’s daily workflow, it provides everyone with a centralized platform for communication and collaboration, outside the chaotic email inbox. The universal portal solution creates a more reliable channel to welcome a site to a new study or send them praise when the study hits significant milestones.

These interactions are a true lever of engagement in the frequently digital and detached state of clinical research, where sponsors, CROs, and their site partners have limited opportunities for face-to-face communication.

Partnering for a solution: why you shouldn't reinvent the wheel

To overcome the challenges faced by sponsors and CROs in providing sites with the resources they need, a shift in mindset is required. Rather than building their own portals, sponsors and CROs should focus on finding a universal portal solution that meets the needs of all parties involved.

As Kimball noted, "Why build it when it's already built and already working? They should really be evaluating what the best in class is, and then figure out the best way to continue to grow and develop their portfolio within something that’s already working."

Pharmaceutical companies historically lack technical expertise, making it more effective to let others in the industry develop software and technology. By utilizing an existing, best-in-class portal solution, they can save time and resources while providing site staff with the tools necessary to run a successful clinical trial. 

While sponsor technology portals have the potential to streamline clinical trials and make them more efficient, legacy solutions have missed the mark by focusing on the needs of sponsors rather than site staff. Instead of reinventing the wheel, let's prioritize using and refining existing solutions that work for all stakeholders involved in clinical trials. By doing so, we can save valuable time, resources, and money while enhancing trial efficiency, engagement, and success.

If you're a sponsor or CRO looking for a study portal solution that was designed alongside sites to meet their unique needs, consider VersaTrial. Contact us today to learn more and schedule a demo.

¹ SCRS. (2019). SCRS Site Landscape Initiative: CTMS Landscape Report.