On March 3-4, 2016, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine's Forum on Neuroscience and Nervous System Disorders held a workshop in Washington, DC, bringing together key stakeholders to discuss opportunities for improving the integrity, efficiency, and validity of clinical trials for nervous system disorders. Participants in the workshop represented a range of diverse perspectives, including individuals not normally associated with traditional clinical trials. The purpose of this workshop was to generate discussion about not only what is feasible now, but what may be possible with the implementation of cutting-edge technologies in the future.

Clinical trials have two purposes -- to treat the patients in the trial, and to obtain information which increases our understanding of the disease and especially how patients respond to treatment. Statistical design provides a means to achieve both these aims, while statistical data analysis provides methods for extracting useful information from the trial data. Recent advances in statistical computing have enabled statisticians to implement very rapidly a broad array of methods which previously were either impractical or impossible. Biostatisticians are now able to provide much greater support to medical researchers working in both clinical and laboratory settings. As our collective toolkit of techniques for analyzing data has grown, it has become increasingly difficult for biostatisticians to keep up with all the developments in our own field. Recent Advances in Clinical Trial Design and Analysis brings together biostatisticians doing cutting-edge research and explains some of the more recent developments in biostatistics to clinicians and scientists who work in clinical trials.

v. 1. Research findings -- v. 2. Concepts and methodology -- v. 3. Implementation issues -- v. 4. Programs, tools and products.

In the realm of health care, privacy protections are needed to preserve patients' dignity and prevent possible harms. Ten years ago, to address these concerns as well as set guidelines for ethical health research, Congress called for a set of federal standards now known as the HIPAA Privacy Rule. In its 2009 report, Beyond the HIPAA Privacy Rule: Enhancing Privacy, Improving Health Through Research, the Institute of Medicine's Committee on Health Research and the Privacy of Health Information concludes that the HIPAA Privacy Rule does not protect privacy as well as it should, and that it impedes important health research.

The National Cancer Institute's (NCI) Clinical Trials Cooperative Group Program has played a key role in developing new and improved cancer therapies. However, the program is falling short of its potential, and the IOM recommends changes that aim to transform the Cooperative Group Program into a dynamic system that efficiently responds to emerging scientific knowledge; involves broad cooperation of stakeholders; and leverages evolving technologies to provide high-quality, practice-changing research.

Improving healthcare and staying healthy is one of the most discussed and important issues in our society. Technology has played and will play an important role in many aspects of the healthcare system, and it offers new and better ways to solve the key health problems of the new century. This book describes valued contributions of technology for improving hospital and home healthcare, and gives a perspective on how they will influence critical aspects of future medical care. It provides an overview and discussion of trends, presents the state-of-the-art of important research areas, and highlights recent breakthrough results in selected fields, giving an outlook on game-changing developments in the coming decades. The material is arranged in 6 parts and a total of 31 chapters. The healthcare areas addressed are: General advances and trends in healthcare technology, diagnostic imaging, integration of imaging and therapy, molecular medicine, medical information technology and personal healthcare.

The very rapid pace of advances in biomedical research promises us a wide range of new drugs, medical devices, and clinical procedures. The extent to which these discoveries will benefit the public, however, depends in large part on the methods we choose for developing and testing them. Modern Methods of Clinical Investigation focuses on strategies for clinical evaluation and their role in uncovering the actual benefits and risks of medical innovation. Essays explore differences in our current systems for evaluating drugs, medical devices, and clinical procedures; health insurance databases as a tool for assessing treatment outcomes; the role of the medical profession, the Food and Drug Administration, and industry in stimulating the use of evaluative methods; and more. This book will be of special interest to policymakers, regulators, executives in the medical industry, clinical researchers, and physicians.