T-08: Analyzing Real-World Data To Target Hard-to-Identify Patient Populations for Clinical Trials: A Case Study in Blood Cancers

Poster Presenter

Stelios Tzellos

Senior Consultant
IQVIA
United Kingdom

Objectives

Clinical research organizations (CROs) face challenges identifying and recruiting patients with orphan diseases for increasingly complex clinical trials. The objective of this study was to identify UK hospitals treating rare blood cancers in order to support patient recruitment.

Method

Real-world data (RWD) was used to identify UK hospitals treating specific hematological malignancies, including specific and rare subtypes of leukemia and non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL). Blood cancer drug prescriptions and ICD-10 diagnosis codes were used in this analysis.

Results

Approximately 180 UK hospitals that treat blood cancer patient populations were identified. Of those, around 80 hospitals were found to treat four distinct subtypes of NHL (follicular, marginal zone, mantle cell, and diffuse large B-cell lymphomas). In addition, over 3300 oncologists and hematologists were identified as specialists working at these hospitals.

Conclusion

Identification of UK hospitals and physicians treating blood cancer patients enabled these hospitals and physicians to be contacted to engage them in clinical trial activity. By combining the analysis from a range of hematological malignancies, a more efficient network of hospitals and physicians treating all blood cancer subtypes were identified. This approach has the potential to expedite patient recruitment, reduce the cost associated with clinical trial enrolment, and accelerate patient access to novel therapies.