Recruiting patients in rare disease with digital tactics

Inflection Point

Our client, a biotech working towards accelerated approval, wanted to redouble clinical trial recruitment efforts in an ultra-rare disease with acute onset, rapid progression, and no existing approved treatment options. It was important to find potential participants at the right moment so they could learn about the trial and find a trial location. The goal was ultimately to recruit approximately two dozen eligible trial participants.

How We Helped

Using our biomedical communications expertise and our deep understanding of the disease state, we developed paid media messaging that would stand out to patients who were grappling with a new diagnosis. From there, we designed and built a three-page website that highlighted four key categories of information:

• education for the ultra-rare disease state, to help relevant patients find the site and better understand their diagnosis.
• specific clinical trial details, to help potential participants understand what to expect.
• interim results from the trial (i.e., a Plain Language Summary), to help build credibility and show how the trial contributes to medical knowledge
• general facts about clinical trials, to help clarify questions or misconceptions.

To accompany the website, we created print versions of the content that were distributed to investigators to use as part of education and informed consent for potential trial participants.

Upon completion and internal approvals, we worked with our client’s contract research organization (CRO) to receive institutional review board (IRB) approval on the materials.

Outcomes

Feedback from investigators on the materials was very positive, and they were eager to use them. After the first month, the website was delivering over 500 monthly visitors spending at least 90-seconds on the site. Paid social was a particularly effective driver of traffic, delivering 60% of the engaged traffic at a cost-per-click under 5¢.