It is inspiring to see how everyone has worked together during this difficult period
I am a pharmacy technician and I currently work as a pharmacy clinical trial coordinator for Barts Health. I am part of a larger team made up of pharmacy assistants, technicians and pharmacists and we help to setup and run clinical trials using medicines across all sites within the trust.
We are involved throughout the lifecycle of clinical trials from initial feasibility and assessment of new studies to final close-out and archiving of trial documentation for completed studies. We review new studies to ensure that we have the capacity and resources to safely run the study taking into account any specialised equipment or facilities that may be required for storage and dispensing of the trial medicines. Whilst trials are ongoing we ensure that medicines are stored appropriately according to the sponsors instructions, and we maintain comprehensive records to ensure there is an accurate audit trail of trial medicines including receipt, dispensing to trial participants and final destruction.
My role requires me to liaise with a wide range of people including researchers within Barts Health, the Joint Research Management Office (JRMO) as well as external study sponsors. Good communication and teamwork is essential as it can be challenging trying to keep abreast of all the studies in setup and ensure we are meeting required timelines.
Like most other teams within the trust the last year has seen major changes for us due to the covid pandemic. With a pause on much of the routine research taking place we focussed on opening Covid-19 and urgent public health studies. This meant setting up new studies in record time so that they could be made available to as many participants as possible. We also play an active role in the delivery of one of the covid vaccine studies at the vaccine hub at Bethnal Green Library.
It is inspiring to see how everyone has worked together during this difficult period in order to setup the vaccine hub and fast-track the opening of covid studies, and it’s extremely satisfying knowing that you are playing a part in improving health outcomes for the local population.