Lynnette Averill, PhD, is an associate research scientist in psychiatry at Yale University and the US Department of Veterans Affairs. In 2016, Dr. Averill received a two-year Patterson Trust Mentored Clinical Research Award, which allowed her to study rapid acting treatments for suicidal ideations (SI) in veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
According to Dr. Averill’s grant report, an estimated 22 veterans die by suicide daily in the United States. Considering the incredible burden and risk for those with severe PTSD symptoms and SI, fast-tracked antisuicidal effects are urgently needed.
There are only two FDA-approved medications for PTSD, and both require weeks and (in some cases) months to take effect.
Inspired by recent studies and literature that revealed ketamine has a very rapid and robust antidepressant effect, Dr. Averill decided to further the ketamine research within the PTSD or psychotrauma spectrum.
With her background and specialization in trauma-focused neuroimaging, Dr. Averill sought to apply multidisciplinary tools such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and clinical and cognitive assessment to examine neurobiological mechanisms underlying suicidal ideation (SI) in veterans with PTSD.
Patient recruitment for Dr. Averill’s study began by reaching out to the Veterans Affairs (VA) community. However, Dr. Averill quickly learned that involved, community-based recruitment took up a lot of time and resources, both crucial elements of which researchers have a limited supply.
“Recruitment takes a lot of time if you’re doing the boots-on-the-pavement sort of recruitment,” Dr. Averill said. She and her team did a lot of legwork to make sure the word was out about the study and the kind of patients they were looking for.
For the most part, the community-based outreach worked well. A lot of veterans took initiative in contacting Dr. Averill and her team about the study. However, the study was still not getting the volume of patients it required. Previously, Dr. Averill had tried running a TV ad for a separate PTSD study (for which Trialfacts is also now helping Dr. Averill recruit) with very little success.
Dr. Averill also tried radio outreach, but that also proved difficult. The radio ad, which had cost around $3,500 to produce, resulted in two phone calls, neither of which made it to the screening stage.
We asked Dr. Averill how she prevented the funding mechanism from becoming an issue—she hesitated for a moment before responding with a laugh.
Working together with Trialfacts seemed like an interesting option compared to other traditional recruitment methods.
“The idea of working with a recruitment company like Trialfacts, that specializes in online and social media recruitment was very novel and exciting,” Dr. Averill said. We know this is where the world is going, it seems, to find everything online.
Her biggest concern, however, was whether or not she would get the approval of the institutional review board (IRB) for working with a third-party vendor.
After IRB approval and undergoing Trialfacts’ due diligence process, Dr. Averill was confident in her choice in working with Trialfacts to maximize recruitment.
How Did Trialfacts Help You Reach Your Goals?
“I think Trialfacts has been a bit of a saving grace for us,” Dr. Averill told us. “Because recruitment has been so successful, but also because it doesn’t require anything from us, beyond getting on that initial phone call and sending [Trialfacts] some documents.” The team has been great to work with, very responsive, very thoughtful in their preparation of documents, and has a good handle on research and some of the inherent challenges.
Time is an important resource for any researcher—being able to balance multiple studies, as well as multiple elements like recruitment and actual procedures involved in any clinical study is quite challenging.
When time is of the essence and resources are needed to perform various tasks, having Trialfacts help out with recruitment liberated Dr. Averill’s team to focus on more important things.
Trialfacts’ prescreening system has also saved Dr. Averill and her team a lot of time in terms of screening every patient to determine whether or not they were eligible to participate in the study. Even though most recruitment companies promise a large number of patients, a large percentage of those patients rarely turn into actual participants.
“I think the prescreening process [Trialfacts] has is very useful. Not only are we getting referrals, but many of the referrals turn into participants,” Dr. Averill said.
Despite the many challenges Dr. Averill and her team have faced in the last year of kicking off multiple studies, the future looks bright.
To learn more about Dr. Lynnette Averill’s research, visit her National Center for PTSD or YSM profile pages. To learn more about how Trialfacts may be able to help with your study, contact us for an initial assessment.
Note: The opinions expressed in this interview are solely those of Dr. Averill and do not necessarily reflect that of the Department of Veterans Affairs or Yale University.
I thought this article, "Failure is Not an Option": Dr. Lynnette Averill on Recruiting Veterans for a Potential PTSD Treatment, might interest you.