Why is Denmark the Right Place to Perform Clinical Trials?

By Centre for Innovation and Research, The Capital Region of Denmark and Biopeople, Denmark’s  Innovation Network for Health and Life Sciences

The unique Danish life science environment makes it optimal for companies to execute clinical research in various therapeutic areas. Important parameters such as time, economy, infrastructure, educational level and possibility of handling complexity work in favour of companies located in Denmark.

There is a far-reaching, close and mutually respectful multidisciplinary collaboration between academia and the industry. These relationships, both formal and informal, have fostered an impressive drug development pipeline as well as innovative use of new technology to improve efficiency of existing drugs.

In The Capital Region there is a clear strategy to keep attracting clinical trials to the regional hospitals. Collaboration with industry is important as it means development in available treatments for patients and hands-on experience with new drugs for doctors. The Capital Region has established a one stop shop entry for the industry to the hospitals in the region. This one stop shop offers to assist the industry in the feasibility process and other relevant matters of clinical trials. The one stop shop initiative is expanded to all Danish regions from January 2013, which means, the industry is offered one entry to all Danish hospitals in, for example, the feasibility process.

Besides, the Danish regions have taken initiatives to ease the process of entering clinical trial agreements across the involved regions. Standard clinical trial agreements are developed between the regions and industry which results in easier start-up of trials. The one stop shop in The Capital Region is part of Centre for Innovation and Research where hospital staff and industry have access to a variety of research supporting services as technology transfer assistance, legal advice and grant support.

Applying for a clinical trial authorisation in Denmark is simple and fast. Because patient retention is high, the costs per evaluable data point come out quite favourable. Denmark is economically competitive when performing clinical trials.

In Denmark you benefit from patient and population registration. The Danish population is homogeneous with registered and easily accessible data, which provides unique information on the patient population. Denmark has organised public health and death registries and a unique social security number system. Thus, data are available for studies, making Denmark particularly suited for epidemiological and clinical research. The Danish population is quite homogeneous and relatively non-mobile, making it ideal for longitudinal studies, as the lost-to-follow-up rate is very low.

We have a large number of highly esteemed CROs with a high level of experience in setting up and conducting clinical trials at all stages – from preclinical through phase IV ensuring a high level of data quality. Danish hospitals have ample capacity, broad experience in executing clinical trials and process management resulting in high efficiency and less time consuming procedures. Exceptional conditions for performing clinical trials are due to a general high educational level and outstanding English skills of the Danish population.

The Danish track record for clinical trial aspects per capita is among the best in the world. In general, the public recognises that research is needed in order to advance medicine. Thus, it is relatively easy to recruit and obtain consent from eligible study participants.

One stop shop for the industry within clinical trials:

For further information please contact

Britta Smedegaard Andersen
Consultant, Clinical Trial Research
Phone: + 45 3866 6934
Mobil: + 45 3045 9768
Mail:
www.regionh.dk/vif

Niels Westergaard
Science Liaison Officer
Mobil: +45 2383 9939
Mail:
www.biopeople.ku.dk