The coronavirus is not the first infectious disease that has forced clinical trials to adapt. Zika, Ebola and other diseases called for the world to adjust and collaborate global research efforts. With COVID-19, the rapid spread and impact on global healthcare systems forced us to change our trial management and accelerate our processes like never before. The global research community have already discovered and developed several tests and vaccines in record time through collaboration. Yet we are still working on predictive biomarker testing to identify people who are at the most risk of developing severe symptoms, epidemiological, vaccine and genetic studies.

To facilitate testing, research, and innovation and to ensure trials continued, Cerba Research and Cerba Healthcare adapted our capabilities and facilities to push research continuity.

Watch this webinar and discover the answers to these questions:

• Did we succeed, how fast did we adapt and are we ready to face a new pandemic crisis in the future?
• How did we maintain the high security and confidence of testing, and what did our reactivity and proactivity mean in the context of a health crisis?

While most people with COVID-19 recover within a few weeks, a notable percentage experience symptoms that last for 12 weeks or longer. With therapy development, we look into clinical diagnostics.

As scientists discover new variants, new questions become more relevant: How will variants impact vaccine efficacy? Who will need booster shots? Will we need new vaccines? Targeting a multifaceted disease such as COVID-19 requires a diverse team of infectious disease experts; it will also require a central lab and clinical diagnostics partner with the expertise and portfolio of testing to serve sponsors’ varied needs.

As the effort to develop more effective COVID-19 treatments and vaccines and protect the global public continues, therapy and vaccine developers must partner with central labs that offer a broad scope of services. A diverse portfolio of exploratory tools and tests is paramount when studying an unpredictable virus.

Find out more about Cerba’s research into COVID-19 by downloading our white paper.

Innovations in precision medicine have the potential to transform healthcare and create tailor-made medical solutions for patients. Clinical Trials Insight talks to Mario Papillon, CEO of Cerba Research, about how his organisation is helping patients receive novel treatments faster by making clinical trials more efficient. This agility, combined with global access to industry-leading laboratories, has been key in the fight against Covid-19, and will continue to be an imperative in the new reality in which future clinical trials will have to exist.

Read the full article here

Why do some patients respond to therapy while others do not? The answer can be found in the concept of biomarkers: objective, measurable indicators of the
presence or severity of disease. Used for decades to aid medical diagnosis, researchers today use biomarkers in every phase of drug discovery and development.
There’s good reason. Biomarkers can triple drug development success rates, accelerating the availability of new therapeutics.

Download our article by Jérôme Sallette, CSO at Cerba Research, to learn more on the advantages of biomarkers in clinical research.

Cerba Research performed a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial to evaluate the efficacy and safety of a new therapy in the treatment of uncomplicated influenza.

Testing algorithms were complex as multiple PCR results had to be obtained from each sample, with only a single freeze-thaw cycle. Shipping the virology samples was also a challenge since maximum effort should be made to ship samples on the day, alternatively, they would be stored and shipped refrigerated within 48 hours, or on dry ice later.

discover how our experts succeeded