Alzheimer's Clinical Trials: Finding Participants

Courtesy of Athira Pharma, Psychiatrist and Medical Director Bernardo Ng of the Sun Valley Research Center joins Suzanne to talk about how they reach out to the community to find people to participate in Alzheimer's clinical trials, particularly in underserved groups such as Latino populations in the United States.

Dr. Ng says, "We've done a lot of different things and we've learned as we go. What we do constantly is to participate in what's called health fairs. So the health department, some federal clinics, some schools, and the local community college periodically put together health fairs, and some of my people go there. It's old fashioned, mouth to mouth. And we do what we call a free memory test, which is a pen and pen paper test with questions.

"We have a few long-term retirement homes. If the owners or the administrative team allow us, we go visit them and give them a talk and say what we do. That has been it is very hard to predict. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. 

"And then we suddenly discovered that Facebook works, and that this population likes Facebook. So we hired a firm that manages our social media, we run ads in English and in Spanish. So the same message we put it one day in English the other day in Spanish. If you click, it asks you, do you agree to be called by a prescreening team. There's these young people who are very good on the phone, and bilingual, and they're very kind and patient, and they talk to the people that have clicked. Those calls can get very long, and more times than not, they're very well received. The moment they hear the word 'research,' there is like a pause. So we, we've turned our people to be more informative about it. You know, you participate voluntarily, you can get out of the trial any time you want. Little by little, we're getting people to contact us that way."

Contact the Sun Valley Research Center in southern California at (760) 545-0123.

Learn more:
* Sun Valley Research Center: https://sunvalleyb.com/
* Athira Pharma: https://www.athira.com/
* Bernardo Ng: https://sunvalleyr.com/ourteam/bernardo-ng-md/
* Hear more Alzheimer's-related podcasts from Athira Pharma: https://answersforelders.com/athira-pharma/

Answers for Elders is part of the SeniorResource Network: https://www.seniorresource.com/
Check out our affiliate podcast Alzheimer’s Speaks: https://alzheimersspeaks.com/

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