MRC CTU Podcasts

Octopus is a new clinical trial for people living with progressive multiple sclerosis (MS), which is designed and run by the MRC CTU at UCL. Thanks to its multi-arm multi-stage platform design, Octopus has the potential to transform the way treatments for progressive MS are tested. The trial is now open in the UK and will be recruiting participants for the next few years.

The podcast mini-series will explore the trial from different perspectives by talking to neurologists, MS experts and people affected by MS.

Part 1 covers the treatment and research landscape of MS and the challenges of treating progressive MS. It features Jeremy Chataway, neurologist at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery at UCLH, Professor of Neurology at UCL and co-lead of the Neurodegenerative Diseases progamme at the MRC CTU at UCL, who is leading the Octopus trial. We also hear from Dawn Lyle, Lead Research MS Nurse, and Matthew Justin, MS Specialist, who are based at the Anne Rowling Regenerative Neurologic Clinic in Edinburgh.

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For more information and to access the transcript: https://bit.ly/3S6FKP4

For questions or feedback on the series, message us at [email protected]

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Innovative platform designs present an opportunity to run faster and more efficient clinical trials.

Clinical trials methodology is a research area that looks at how to improve the design, conduct, and analysis of clinical trials. It focuses on developing and implementing new methods to help run trials faster and more efficiently, that will ultimately accelerate the discovery of new treatments.

In this episode, methodologist Matteo Quartagno tells us about a new clinical trial design called MAMS-ROCI. It is a type of multi-arm multi-stage design that compares a range of different treatment durations, dose or frequencies to identify the optimal one.

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For questions or feedback on the series, message us at [email protected]

For more information and to access the transcript: https://bit.ly/3ZpyKhG

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STAMPEDE is a long-running trial in advanced prostate cancer, in which nearly 12,000 men have taken part. Thanks to its multi-arm multi-stage platform design, STAMPEDE has tested many different treatments and directly led to improvements in the standard of prostate cancer care several times.

This Trial Talk podcast mini-series will explore the trial’s journey from its inception in the early 2000s to the end of patient recruitment in March 2023.

In the final part, Max Parmar and Nick James look back over the trial’s impact on clinical practice and platform trial design and look forward to STAMPEDE2, sharing their hopes for the future of prostate cancer research.

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Further information is available on the STAMPEDE study page at www.mrcctu.ucl.ac.uk

For questions or feedback on the series, message us at [email protected]

For more information and to access the transcript: bit.ly/3OQWhV8

As a listener, your opinion is very valuable to us. Please help us to improve the podcast in future by filling in this short survey: forms.office.com/e/PjfjQ5Mn6g

STAMPEDE is a long-running trial in advanced prostate cancer, in which nearly 12,000 men have taken part. Thanks to its multi-arm multi-stage platform design, STAMPEDE has tested many different treatments and directly led to improvements in the standard of prostate cancer care several times.

This Trial Talk podcast mini-series will explore the trial’s journey from its inception in the early 2000s to the end of patient recruitment in March 2023.

Part 2 is about patient and public involvement (PPI) in the trial. David Matheson, a Reader at the University of Wolverhampton and STAMPEDE patient representative, shares his insight into the work this entails and why it is so important to champion the voices of patients. We also hear about PPI from the perspective of trial researchers, Max Parmar and Nick James.

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Further information is available on the STAMPEDE study page at www.mrcctu.ucl.ac.uk

For questions or feedback on the series, message us at [email protected]

For more information and to access the transcript: bit.ly/3OQWhV8

As a listener, your opinion is very valuable to us. Please help us to improve the podcast in future by filling in this short survey: forms.office.com/e/PjfjQ5Mn6g

STAMPEDE is a long-running trial in advanced prostate cancer, in which nearly 12,000 men have taken part. Thanks to its multi-arm multi-stage platform design, STAMPEDE has tested many different treatments and directly led to improvements in the standard of prostate cancer care several times.

This Trial Talk podcast mini-series will explore the trial’s journey from its inception in the early 2000s to the end of patient recruitment in March 2023.

Part 1 covers the landscape of prostate cancer treatment before STAMPEDE, as well how the trial was designed, featuring two researchers who lead the methodological and clinical sides of the trial: Max Parmar, Professor of Medical Statistics and Epidemiology and Director of the MRC Clinical Trials Unit at UCL and UCL's Institute of Clinical Trials and Methodology, and Nick James, Professor of Prostate and Bladder Cancer Research at the Institute of Cancer Research.

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Further information is available on the STAMPEDE study page at www.mrcctu.ucl.ac.uk

For questions or feedback on the series, message us at [email protected]

For more information and to access the transcript: https://bit.ly/3OQWhV8

As a listener, your opinion is very valuable to us. Please help us to improve the podcast in future by filling in this short survey: forms.office.com/e/PjfjQ5Mn6g

Immunotherapy drugs fight cancer by helping the immune system recognise and attack cancer cells. These drugs have revolutionised cancer treatment over the last decade, improving survival for many people with different types of cancer. However, researchers are still unsure of the best way to give immunotherapy, which can come with unpredictable side effects.

In this episode, Clinical Fellow Sophie Merrick discusses how the REFINE trial hopes to address this problem, by testing if giving immunotherapy less frequently can still treat the cancer effectively, whilst improving the quality of life for patients, reducing side effects and costs.

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Further information is available on the REFINE study page at www.mrcctu.ucl.ac.uk

For questions or feedback on the series, message us at [email protected]

For more information and to access the transcript: https://bit.ly/3DgIDE2

As a listener, your opinion is very valuable to us. Please help us to improve the podcast in future by filling in this short survey: https://forms.office.com/e/PjfjQ5Mn6g

Running a clinical trial means collecting a lot of data from the trial participants. But some of this data might be collected and stored in healthcare systems, as well as in clinical trial case report forms.

What if we could avoid this doubling up, save time and resources, improve recruitment and reduce missing data?

In this episode we explore the opportunities and challenges of using healthcare systems data in clinical trials, with Dr Macey Murray and Professor Matt Sydes.

Resources:

British Heart Foundation Data Science Centre webinar (Macey Murray) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzQeMUUG7tQ

How to get your own crocheted duck - https://twitter.com/drmakerbaker/status/1628122224971419665?s=20

For more questions or feedback on the series, contact us at [email protected]

For more information and access to the transcript of this episode: https://bit.ly/3NKtKjs

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Neonatal sepsis is a life-threatening infection that affects up to 3 million babies per year globally.

In an effort to identify better treatments, the NeoSep1 clinical trial evaluates new antibiotic combinations for newborn babies with sepsis. To learn more about the trial, we speak to Adrie Bekker and Cristina Obiero, principal investigators of the trial in South Africa and Kenya, Reenu Thomas, a neonatologist from South Africa, and Francesca Schiavone, the clinical project manager of the NeoSep1 trial in London.

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Further information about the NeoSep1 clinial trial is available at www.mrcctu.ucl.ac.uk and https://gardp.org/.

For questions or feedback on the series, message us at [email protected]

For more information and to access the transcript: https://bit.ly/3MSKkw5

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214,000 newborn babies die of sepsis caused by infections that are resistant to antibiotics every year. This is a major problem worldwide, but disproportionally affects low- and middle- income countries.

Reenu Thomas and Adrie Bekker, two neonatologists from South Africa, and Francesca Schiavone, clinical project manager at the MRC CTU at UCL in London, discuss the challenges of treating neonatal sepsis and present the results from an observational study (NeoOBS), which assessed mortality rates of babies with sepsis.

Further information about the NeoOBS study is available at www.mrcctu.ucl.ac.uk and https://gardp.org/.

For questions or feedback on the series, message us at [email protected]

For more information and to access the transcript: https://bit.ly/45zdn0j

As a listener, your opinion is very valuable to us. Please help us to improve the podcast in future by filling in this short survey: https://forms.office.com/e/PjfjQ5Mn6g

For World TB Day, this episode explores the global burden of tuberculosis (TB) and how growing antibiotic resistance can complicate treatment options. Andrew Nunn, a Professor of Epidemiology, discusses his work on the STREAM2 trial, which investigated how treatment for multi-drug resistant TB could be shortened and made more acceptable for patients.

Further information is available on the STREAM Stage 2 study page at www.mrcctu.ac.uk and results from STREAM2 are published open access in The Lancet.

For questions or feedback on the series, message us at [email protected]

For more information and to access the transcript: http://bit.ly/3TDnz24

As a listener, your opinion is very valuable to us. Please help us to improve the podcast in future by filling in this short survey: https://forms.office.com/e/PjfjQ5Mn6g