Labcorp delivers unmatched COVID-19 diagnostic and therapeutic applications
We’re in this together: How they are delivering unmatched acceleration of COVID-19 diagnostic and therapeutic applications
Accelerating much needed COVID-19 testing, vaccines and treatment options across the world can’t be done alone. We’re in this together and ready to apply our unique combination of solutions that blend Covance and Labcorp’s drug development and diagnostic capabilities in a highly collaborative environment with our industry partners (pharma, biotech, medical device and IVD companies).
Learn about our latest COVID-19 success stories and our strategic plan to help sponsors achieve their aggressive goals and ultimately meet patients’ urgent needs.
Providing dedicated COVID-19 Response Teams for rapid startup
With a single point of contact, sponsors can reach our COVID-19 Response Team, designed to provide direct connections to our scientific, medical, regulatory and operational specialists who can assess each study to expedite project review and initiation.
We already witnessed the success of this team as they collaborated in planning a clinical development program, connected with regulatory authorities, aligned the drug supply and recruited volunteers for the first-in-human study. Our team reached the first subject visit in just 14 business days. This level of speed and collaboration in the relentless pursuit of breakthroughs in both diagnostics and therapeutics for COVID-19 is truly amazing. This success echoes the success of Labcorp’s unprecedented achievement in developing diagnostic tests for COVID-19 in record time.
Moving forward, the COVID-19 Response Teams will continue to share best practices to help accelerate study design and execution, the use of template WHO protocols to reduce time, focused approaches to new assay validation, rapid site startup, vendor management and the use our established Xcellerate® tools for remote monitoring.
Seamlessly integrating cross-functional expertise for your end-to-end development
Responding rapidly to COVID-19 drug development challenges is a team effort. Sponsors can apply our experience gained from 700+ infectious disease trials, 150+ vaccine trials and 250+ vaccine and antiviral laboratory-based studies over the last five years as we share lessons learned, and emulate best practices that will make a difference in COVID-19 trials.
Whether supporting medical device or diagnostic testing solutions, early phase development such as molecule screening, formulation, exploratory assay development, we are working through the transition to clinic testing and clinical development. In addition, through other services such as patient recruitment, global trials and market access and post-marketing safety assessments, our sponsors can access a breadth of comprehensive services unmatched by any other organization. To complement our integrated solutions, we also provide a high level of connectivity with regulators, governments, manufacturers, investigators and patients.
Together, we know how to quickly transition between phases in order to help our sponsors eliminate the gap between transition or handoff points and keep moving ahead. We leverage our connected insights to provide guidance on critical decisions that could impact later stage development.
Enabling focused recruitment with diagnostic insights and proprietary patient data
The combined power of our diagnostic and drug development businesses is evident in our ability to help sponsors access the latest laboratory methods for assessment of COVID-19 diagnostics and immunologic response, refine patient-centric recruitment strategies and understand the voice of the patient in trial recruitment and design approaches.
But we can also look beyond the raw data to connect with patients. Using our proprietary Lacorp database, we can locate consenting, pre-screened patients who meet specific inclusion/exclusion criteria, drawn from Labcorp testing of 20% of the U.S. population. A portion of those people who have provided consent to be contacted have also provided feedback via surveys about their likelihood to participate in a COVID-19 study, potential concerns that would prevent engagement, willingness to utilize decentralized clinical trial practices such as self-administration of nasal swabs or medication and acceptance of healthcare professionals in their home to perform routine procedures.
By incorporating valuable voice of the patient data, we can help sponsors better understand patients’ mindsets about joining a study and design more appropriate, patient-centric protocol. We can then combine Labcorp diagnostics and voice of the patient knowledge with our data from the Central Laboratories, which collects data from nearly 50% of all ongoing global clinical trials, to offer sponsors the unique ability to identify high-performing and experienced sites in infectious disease or trial designs based on historical site or country recruitment performance.
From a public health and policy perspective, Labcorp diagnostic testing can also help monitor the real-time status of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. Our data can help inform can help inform reopening timelines and shelter-in-place ordinances across the country. These diagnostic data can also empower drug development decisions, highlighting the key interactions between our drug development and diagnostic enterprise.
Reaching patients, safely, in a challenging trial setting
The safety of healthcare providers and patients will remain a key challenge in many COVID-19 studies of vaccines, antivirals or treatments from the cytokine storm. Trials will rely on several decentralized clinical trial practices and technologies, such as eConsent, ePRO, eCOA and telemedicine, that can reduce the frequency of on-site visits and gather valuable patient data to inform decision making.
Patient enrollment and retention can also be improved with the use of conveniently located, local resources such as Labcorp’s U.S.-based Patient Service Centers (PSCs) and global partnerships with home health phlebotomy and nursing service providers, all connected by a best-in-class technology platform with patient- and site-facing applications to enable remote recruiting, enrollment and data collection.
Harnessing the power of the combined
No single organization, government or healthcare authority can take on the COVID-19 pandemic alone. Collaboration, cross-functional expertise and flexibility will be key to efficiently developing a vaccine, diagnostic or treatment. We know our unique combination of drug development and diagnostic solutions will help accelerate progress in this time of critical need. We’re in this together and ready to make a difference for patients. Patients can’t wait and neither can we.
Contact our COVID-19 Response Team to learn to about how we can help.