Understanding the investigators: a qualitative study investigating the barriers and enablers to the implementation of local investigator-initiated clinical trials in Ethiopia

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New BMJ OPEN article: “Understanding the investigators:  a qualitative study investigating the barriers and enablers to the implementation of local investigator-initiated clinical trials in Ethiopia”

You can read the full article at: http://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/3/11/e003616.full or download the PDF via the link to the right under 'Useful Resources'.

This article was written by the research team at Global Health Trials in collaboration with researchers from Ethiopia, Sri Lanka and Peru.

The research was initiated in response to the low volume of clinical trials conducted by investigators in Low and Middle Income Countries. Local investigator-initiated clinical trials could produce valuable context specific and robust data to inform local clinical practice and policies. However few trials are conducted in Low and Middle Income Countries, and most of them are led by foreign partners. 

Our aim was to understand why so few trials are initiated by researchers in Ethiopia and to hypothesise strategies that would increase their conduct. 

This article summarises the findings from the pilot study in Ethiopia. Subsequent, larger scale research has been conducted in Cameroon and Sri Lanka.

We published this article in BMJ Open to ensure that it was freely available and to promote comment and discussion. Please let us know what you think.

• Do you think this is an important topic?
• Are the findings similar to your situation or are there apparent differences?
• Are these driven by differences in resources or by more general context?
• Do you agree with our interpretations or would you have considered the findings in a different light?

We look forward to your comments.

Best wishes, The authors

For further discussion and information relating to this topic please visit www.globalhealthtrials.org