Adaptive Study Design Methodology vs. Standard Randomized Clinical Trial in Different Therapeutic Area: A Review

Abstract:
The aim of this review is to explore the learning outcome and
understanding how the adaptive study design helps in current scenario of drug
development in various therapeutic areas compared to traditional randomized
clinical trials with respect to Dose Finding, identification of Maximum
tolerated dose (MTD), fewer subjects, short duration, increases success rate of
study objective, yields better knowledge of treatment effect like better
estimates of sub-group effects or dose-response relationship. One of the major
advantage of this study design is that potential changes are approved prior
hand by regulatory authorities and ethics committee, hence there is no need to
submit the protocol amendment and also logistics for the change in treatment is
also planned upfront and researchers are given full flexibility to respond
towards unexpected events and there are several options proposed upfront to
introduce any new doses, amend endpoints. The conclusion is that the use of
Adaptive designs appears to be increasing in certain diseases and in some of
the diseases it is still underutilised. FDA and other regulators, researchers
are still exploring how and the extent to which they may be incorporated into
the evaluation of experimental therapies bearing in mind that focus will be
mainly in feasibility, validity, flexibility, integrity and efficiency. As the
new regulatory guideline are already established, future investigations of
adaptive designs could examine ongoing dynamics in trials and based on this
project, there are some suggestions to be given to the researchers to include
the adaptive design or methodology to be indicated in the study title which
certainly helps to retrieve the data easily.
References:
[1] Friedman FL, Furberg CD, DeMets DL.2010,
Fundamentals of clinical trials, New York: Springer; 4th ed.
[2] Shih WJ. 2006, Plan to be flexible: a
commentary on adaptive designs. Biometrical J.; 48:656–9.
[3] Berry Consultants 2016. What is adaptive
design?. http://www.berryconsultants.com/adaptive-designs. Accessed 7 Jul 2017.
[4] Campbell G. 2013, Similarities and
differences of Bayesian designs and adaptive designs for medical devices: a
regulatory view. Stat Biopharm Res.; 5:356–68.
[5] Chow
SC, Chang M, Pong A. 2005, Statistical consideration of adaptive methods in
clinical development. J Biopharm Stat.; 15:575–91.
[6] Fleming TR, Sharples K, McCall J, Moore A,
Rodgers A, Stewart R. 2008, Maintaining confidentiality of interim data to
enhance trial integrity and credibility. Clin Trials.; 5:157–67.
[7] Bauer P, Koenig F, Brannath W, Posch M. 2010,
Selection and bias—two hostile brothers. Stat Med.; 29:1–13.
[8] Posch M, Maurer W, Bretz F. 2011, Type I
error rate control in adaptive designs for confirmatory clinical trials with
treatment selection at interim. Pharm Stat.; 10:96–104.
[9] Graf AC, Bauer P. 2011, Maximum inflation
of the type 1 error rate when sample size and allocation rate are adapted in a
pre-planned interim look. Stat Med.; 30:1637–47.
[10] Graf AC, Bauer P, Glimm E, Koenig F. 2014, Maximum
type 1 error rate inflation in multiarmed clinical trials with adaptive interim
sample size modifications. Biometrical J.; 56:614–30.
[11] Deepak
L, Cyrus Mehta.2016 Adaptive
Designs for Clinical Trials. J Med 375:65-74.
[12] Kristian T , Jonas H , Jay J, Edward J Mills.
2018, Key design considerations for adaptive clinical trials: a primer for
clinicians. BMJ 2018;360:k698.
[13] Rajiv Mahajan, Kapil Gupta. 2010, Adaptive design clinical trials: Methodology, challenges and prospect. Indian J Pharmacol.; 42(4): 201–207