With Halloween coming up soon, I thought I’d reflect on some of the things I find scary about the industry.

One of them is how many sponsor organizations still expect patients to be recruited into their trials without doing anything particular to promote them.

Another is the sense that patients should somehow be grateful for the chance to participate. When in reality the gratitude should be flowing towards the patients – who are, after all, giving of their time and physiology to trial an unproven treatment – which would certainly be helpful for keeping them engaged.

Some of the processes that the research sites are forced to get to grips with are equally scary, and certainly don’t lend themselves to a smooth patient journey through a trial.

And perhaps scariest of all is the high level of patient burden that features in so many trial protocols, that is seemingly designed to ensure nobody becomes interested in taking part.