Clinical Trials are essential steps to bringing new products to market, ensuring their safety and efficacy. It is crucial to involve a diverse range of participants from various communities in these trials, because where we live, how we live, and our backgrounds can impact health outcomes. Additionally, the safety and effectiveness of medications can vary based on factors like age, ethnicity, sex, and race.

One significant challenge faced by iBIO’s members is ensuring diverse representation in clinical trials. When certain groups of people are underrepresented in research, it can lead to gaps in our understanding of their health. This lack of diversity can perpetuate a cycle where new treatments are most effective for the group that was studied the most.

We are seeking recommendations for how to improve diversity in clinical trials to reduce biases, promote health equity and produce more innovative science. Your challenge is to develop a comprehensive strategy to promote diversity and representation in clinical trials. This strategy should address barriers such as limited access to healthcare, cultural perceptions, educational disparities, and systemic inequalities. The ultimate goal is to achieve equitable participation across demographics, ensuring everyone has an equal opportunity to contribute to these critical research endeavors.These recommendations should demonstrate an understanding of the complex issues driving the current lack of diversity and consider recruitment as well as retention strategies. Consideration should be given to legal and ethical principles of clinical trial research.

To be successful, learners will need to complete the following tasks:

• Understand the current landscape of clinical trials including demographics of participants, existing barriers to diversity and previous efforts to address these issues.
• Review historical factors driving reduced participation in clinical trials by women and minority groups. Identify and analyze barriers to diversity and representation in clinical trials. This may include access to healthcare, cultural beliefs and perceptions, educational disparities, language barriers, and systemic inequalities.
• Identify leading recruitment strategies. 
• Recommend where to start in achieving most effective short-term results.
• Develop a blog post on your major findings and recommendations to improve on current strategies.
• Present findings and recommendations to improve clinical trial diversity to employer partners.

Learners will have access to industry experts to provide insights on challenges and current strategies as well as the feasibility of draft proposed solutions through the Riipen platform.

Learners will receive additional mentorship from industry mentors recruited by Waubonsee Community College.