Overview

Clinical trials are the gold standard for demonstrating the benefits of medical innovation, including anti-cancer treatments. However, most are conducted in selected centres under strict protocols, which often fail to reflect the complexity and heterogeneity of real-world practice and populations. Thus, many patients in the European Union (EU) may not benefit from access to cancer clinical trials due to geographic, clinical and normative barriers. Expanding investments in training and infrastructure, increasing the number of participating centres, developing more pragmatic and sustainable clinical trials that better reflect real-life practice across regions, and promoting decentralised research are some of the key solutions.