Clinical trials are part of clinical research, which refers to the studies or projects focused on medical advances for people, either when subjects (patients or healthy volunteers) participate, or when a study is carried out with patient data and/or their biological samples are used. The aims of clinical research can be very diverse, for example, the evaluation of the efficacy and/or safety of new treatments (pharmacological, medical devices, psychological, surgical...) or diagnostic techniques, the study of the prevention of certain pathologies, risk factors and/or biomarkers of diseases or the study of the natural history of diseases.
Types of clinical research
Clinical research studies or projects can be classified according to their goals and design. Before any clinical research is initiated, it must be evaluated by a Research Ethics Committee.