The Medidata Way: A People-centric Approach to Sustaining Healthier Life on the Planet | Medidata Sustainability Series

For over 20 years, we have been putting patients at the center of all we do.

We don’t view clinical trial patients as subjects or data points—we only see people. Because, as a life sciences company, we’re in the business of helping people live healthier lives.

Medidata is fully committed to creating and advancing technology and trial decentralization solutions to make clinical trials more diversified, patient-centric, and efficient for patients. It’s the right thing to do for those who selflessly donate their time and efforts to science. And it’s the right thing for our customers since clinical trials often provide more clinical and financial value when tailored to patients’ needs.

Decentralized, Patient-Centric Trials Are More Sustainable

Decentralized clinical trials—designed with patients in mind—have much higher recruitment and retention rates.¹ Not only does this help CROs gather more robust data sets to better inform the development of their therapies, but it also lets them move through the trial process faster, and with far greater cost-efficiencies. (On average, it costs $6,533 to recruit one patient to a clinical study, and the cost of replacing patients is even higher.)²

A more diversified and patient-centric decentralized trial also provides researchers with more varied data sets that better represent the whole population. People’s ethnicities, ages, genders, and other factors may impact reactions to therapies. Researchers need this important information to make sure the therapies they’re designing are as safe and effective as possible for all people.

At the individual trial level, Medidata’s solutions and technologies help customers collect more diverse data, which in turn helps them align their therapies and medical devices with the broader needs of the communities they serve. Some of these solutions include:

• Medidata Acorn AI’s use of data analytics to identify suitable patients and site locations
• Use of electronic informed consent and trial decentralization tools to increase the accessibility of trials and reduce burden on patients
• Better patient education and engagement through telemedicine
• Risk-based monitoring to build in measures around diversity metrics
• Clinical Trial Management System (CTMS) incentivizing patients through prompt payment

Medidata is working to raise awareness of the underrepresentation of minorities across the entire clinical trial industry—pointing out not just where and how often these disparities exist, but the detrimental effect they have on data quality.

Medidata Alliances at Work

Medidata has a Diversity in Clinical Trials Steering Committee to broaden patient representation in clinical trials, producing patient-facing initiatives and promoting technologies to the research community that help bridge the diversity gap.

Medidata works closely with The Lazarex Cancer Foundation to transform the status quo of clinical trial recruitment and increase minority participation by providing equitable and timely access to cancer discovery for all patients.

Medidata sponsors Tu Salud Tu Familia (Your Health Your Family), a weekly medical education program on Telemundo for the Latinx community, providing valuable information on a range of health issues, including clinical trials.

Practice What We Preach: Diversity in the Workplace

Medidata takes a people-centric, diversity-conscious approach within our own company as well. We’re working hard to make sure Medidata is reflective of the world we want to see by developing and evolving internal business initiatives and corporate structures that promote diversity, equity, safety, and career progression for all employees.

Our Business Resource Groups (BRGs) highlight the diverse perspectives within our organization that have made our company stronger, more customer-centric, innovative, and collaborative. They are goal-based and serve to attract new talent, as well as retain, develop, and reward our current team members, who are our most valuable company asset by far.

Some of our BRGs include:

Medidata Out, LGBTQIA embraces and celebrates all genders, sexualities, and lifestyles. Medidata Out focuses on empowering our local community and increasing awareness and education surrounding LGBTQIA issues.

Women of Color (WOC) is aligned with its fellow Medidata Business Resource Groups to represent, strengthen and improve the diverse perspectives that impact our business and employees while actively working to create and maintain a safe, welcoming, inclusive environment where all Medidatians can thrive.

Women in Technology (WIT) supports, enables and inspires women to excel in technology at Medidata and around the world.

Veterans is a resource group for veterans, dependents, and those who support them. Veterans@Medidata empowers veteran professional development, community outreach, recruiting, and more!

Black Employees at Medidata (BEAM) serves the unique needs of Black Medidatians (i.e., African-American, Caribbean, African, etc.) as they relate to our business, and these communities at-large, for the benefit of Medidata and all of its employees.

Remotians represents all virtual teams in the company. Our mission is to enable Medidata employees and teams to thrive—whether located 3 feet or 3,000 miles away from each other. By doing that, we will help the company succeed in today’s competitive environment.

We also partner with external organizations that advise us on how to better promote diversity, inclusion, and equity company wide. Some of those organizations include:

• CEO Action for Diversity & Inclusion™
• United Nations Global Compact initiative
• Out Leadership
• The Executive Leadership Council (ELC)

Medidata is committed to making our business—and the businesses of our customers and partners—more sustainable by focusing on our shared humanity. By promoting increased diversity, safety, and efficiency throughout the clinical trial industry, both inside and outside our offices, we’re keeping true to our mission to power smarter treatments and healthier people all over the world. 

¹Decentralized Clinical Trials: The Future of Clinical Research Is Here, 2021

²Estimated Costs of Pivotal Trials for Novel Therapeutic Agents Approved by the US Food and Drug Administration, 2015-2016