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Originally publish on Clinical Leader site
Guest Column | September 29, 2020
By Beth Harper
It’s not simply an issue of supply and demand. It’s closer to life and death. Put bluntly, we may not be able to keep up with future clinical trial demand because our workforce isn’t growing fast enough. In fact, by some metrics, we’re already falling behind.
The consequences are dire. We risk missing out on access to new drugs and therapies designed to mitigate suffering and prolong life. We risk slowing our amazing progress in oncology and other therapeutic areas. We risk losing ground in our battle against Alzheimer’s and related diseases.
Surveys and available data suggest that over the last three years there are signs that demand for clinical trial personnel has been increasing, with average compound annual growth in monthly job postings activity of 9.3 percent across all clinical research positions.1 While a nearly 10 percent growth in demand sounds robust, it is somewhat sobering when we see that the average year-over-year growth in clinical trials activities is 12.2 percent over the same time period.
