Current Clinical Trials at Advanced Healthcare

with B. Lauren Charous, M.D., Allergist and Immunologist, Advanced Healthcare

Last Updated: Nov. 1, 2003

Doctors who double as lead investigators on studies testing new drugs have a unique opportunity to provide their patients with access to treatments so new that they’re not even on the market.

Dr. B. Lauren Charous, an allergist and immunologist at Advanced Healthcare, is one of 40 trained physician investigators and is currently the lead investigator on two asthma studies.

B. Lauren Charous, M.D., Allergist and Immunologist, Advanced Healthcare "We’ve caught some significant medical problems of people who’ve come in not knowing they had those problems."

Drug and/or biotechnology companies sponsor the trials, which determine whether the products they’re considering bringing to market are safer and more effective than existing treatments. In some cases, Dr. Charous said, the trials involve drugs already on the market. In those cases, the company is looking for ways to more effectively use them.

Current studies
Dr. Charous’ asthma trials both involve corticosteroids, which are commonly used to treat asthma. Corticosteriods are good at reducing mucus production and swelling in the airways of the lungs. They differ from the anabolic steroids athletes use to enhance performance.

In one study, a corticosteroid and a long-acting bronchiodilator have been combined in a single inhaler. The other trial is examining a novel corticosteroid with a potentially increased standard of safety for treating allergies and asthma.

“We also have trials going year-round looking at new treatments for allergies, and frequently for sinus disease,” Dr. Charous said, “and we’re starting a new trial in the next two months looking at a new oral medication for people with smoker’s lung.”

People with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, also known as smoker’s lung, can volunteer for the study. In addition to being able to help advance medical research, thereby possibly hastening cures for a variety of medical conditions and diseases, there are many benefits for patients who choose to participate in a research trial.

How participants benefit
Among the advantages Dr. Charous lists is the opportunity a study poses for a patient to learn more about the details and symptoms of his or her disease.

“In the pressured nature of clinic visits now, it’s hard to have time,” he said. With study participants, that becomes less of an issue. During the course of a trial, each patient makes multiple visits, thereby spending more time with the doctor and doing so relative to a specific issue.

“In the course of the trial, as they come in for multiple visits, they learn about the symptoms, about the nature of the disease,” he said, “and for anybody with a chronic illness that’s very important to get a real feeling about.”

Research study participants are carefully screened before starting a study, and not everyone who volunteers is chosen to participate. But even in that situation, Dr. Charous said, there can be a benefit to a patient for having made the attempt.

“When you volunteer for a visit, in order to qualify, there’s a screening process that goes on, and that, too, is like a health screen,” he said. If a medical problem is found that the individual was not previously aware of, the patient is referred back to the primary care doctor, who is notified of the findings.

Individuals interested in volunteering to be part of the smoker’s lung trial can contact Advanced Healthcare’s Allergy and Respiratory Clinical Care Office at 414-351-7835.

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