The Rethink Research Competition has opened voting for the People’s Choice Award.

Recruiting patients for clinical research studies is getting harder and harder every year, making medical progress more difficult. Many people have a skeptical or negative attitude toward clinical research. Although the press often reports positive findings from clinical research, negative news stories tend to get the headlines, to say nothing of the portrayals of “villainous” clinical researchers and pharmaceutical companies in movies, television shows and books.

The clinical research enterprise does very little to combat these negative stereotypes. The Center for Information & Study on Clinical Research Participation (CISCRP) is dedicated to educating both patients and the public about clinical research participation, but its resources are limited.

“With the collective efforts of other stakeholders in the industry, together we could see a dramatic change in the public’s view of clinical trials,” said Jill McNair, director of education, outreach and community support at CISCRP.

“If you ask the typical ‘man on the street’ what he thinks of clinical research—if he knows anything about it at all—he is likely to express reservations about being a ‘guinea pig’ in some sketchy corporate experiment,” said Norman Goldfarb, MAGI chairman.

Back in 1983, the milk industry recognized that it had a problem: Milk consumption was declining as the public consumed more exciting beverages. To fight back, the industry created the “Got Milk?” advertising campaign, a series of ads unified by the “Got Milk?” slogan. The rest is history.

At a conference earlier this year, Joe Kim, senior advisor, clinical innovation at Eli Lilly, challenged the clinical research industry to rebrand itself. “Just as the milk industry rebranded milk as a hip beverage, can we rebrand clinical research in a way that deeply resonates with the public?” asked Kim.

Added Goldfarb, “Can we change the man on the street’s answer to: ‘Funny you should ask. I’ve heard good things about clinical research. I really should find a study that’s right for me.’”

The first step in rebranding clinical research is to create a “Got Milk?” advertising concept for clinical research. To accomplish this objective, Rethink Research invited patient recruiting firms to contribute their ideas for a campaign concept to achieve the following objectives:

• Generate ideas for promoting participation in clinical research.
• Create materials that study sponsors, etc., can adapt.
• Generate awareness in the industry of the branding issue and create momentum for it.
• Generate publicity for clinical research.

Four patient recruitment firms—ClinEdge, DAC Patient Recruitment Services, MMG and the Patient Recruiting Agency—accepted the challenge.

They have submitted six entries:

• Clinical research for your future, and hers.
• Going study
• Heroes aren’t hard to come by.
• Missing U
• Remedi THIS
• Side effects may include

Clinical research professionals and the general public are invited to vote for the People’s Choice Award at: http://www.magiworld.org/vote.

A panel of judges also will assess the entries in various prize categories. The judges include:

• Adam Chasse, president, RxTrials
• Norman M. Goldfarb, chairman, MAGI
• Diane Gross, National Program director, Lupus Research Institute, Lupus Foundation
• Joseph Kim, senior advisor, Clinical Innovation, Eli Lilly
• Jill McNair, director of Education, Outreach and Community Support, CISCRP

The winners will be announced at MAGI’s Clinical Research Conference in San Diego, set for Oct. 11 to 14.

“The Rethink Research competition is just the first step in a long journey to change people’s minds about clinical research. Without clinical research, without study participants, there would be no new medicines, no new medical devices, no new diagnostics. That’s not a world we can live in, literally,” said Goldfarb.