What is a Clinical Trial?
Clinical trials are research investigations in which people volunteer to test new treatments to manage various diseases or medical conditions, including osteoarthritis. Some investigations look at how people respond to a new treatment and how this treatment works. Clinical trials help to determine if a new intervention helps the participants if it is safe and if it is better than the interventions that are already available for that condition.
Where are clinical trials registered?
In Australia ethics approved clinical trials can be registered through the Australian and New Zealand Clinical Trial registry.
The ANZCTR is an online public registry of clinical trials, held at the NHMRC Clinical Trials Centre, University of Sydney. It is a Primary Registry in the World Health Organization (WHO) Registry Network, which means that it fulfills certain criteria for content, quality, and validity, accessibility, unique identification, technical capacity, and administration.
The ANZCTR accepts both interventional and observational studies for registration from all countries and the full spectrum of therapeutic areas including trials of pharmaceuticals, surgical procedures, preventive measures, lifestyle, devices, treatment and rehabilitation strategies, and complementary therapies.
All clinical trials that MSCCR is involved in, are registered with the ANZCTR and can be found on their website
What to expect when participating?
At MSCCR we screen our participants both through an initial call from one of our staff and within an initial consultation with one of our trial doctors.
To check for suitability for entry into our clinical trials we may request X-rays, MRI images, Blood tests, questionnaires, and physical examinations
You will have multiple phone calls/appointments with our research nurses, doctors, and administration team. This can be via telehealth, in-clinic appointments, online surveys, and via the telephone.
Questionnaires to be completed to tell us how you are feeling
Throughout the trial, you will have access to our professional and caring staff to support you.
What is a Trial Screening?
At MSCCR we screen our participants both through an initial call from one of our staff and within an initial consultation with one of our trial doctors. All of our trial doctors are Musculoskeletal Physicians with a special interest in the management of osteoarthritis. As our doctors are completing a full health assessment there is an out of pocket cost for these initial consultations.
Should you meet the entry criteria to one of our registered clinical trials, our trial doctors will give you a trial information pack to go home and read through. The doctor will spend time with you answering any questions you have regarding the trial, the possible benefits and drawbacks of participation as well as what to expect from the trial itself.
Should you not be suitable for entry into one of our clinical trials our experienced doctors will give guidance around what other treatments could be suitable for your condition, how to access these as well as referral to other health care services should you wish.
Trial Funding
MSCCR receives no funding from the government or from pharmaceutical companies to run our research trials. Our free trials are primarily funded through our group of investors but a majority of our trials are funded by the patients who would like to participate. Whist we run free trials periodically, these often have very strict entry criteria.
Should you like to be informed of any upcoming trials that have no or minimal cost to participants please sign up for our ongoing research database. We send out information periodically to this database with our research publications as well as any new trials that we intend to recruit for.
Should you wish to have a trial screening for a patient-funded clinical trial please fill out the form below and one of our research team will be in contact.