The Australian Teletrial Program and the NSW/ACT RRR Clinical Trial Enabling Programs are laying the groundwork for an equitable and networked clinical trial system in Australia. Collaborations with the Victorian Teletrial Collaborative have further facilitated the integration of teletrials for cancer trials in Victoria. These infrastructure and capacity-building initiatives are revolutionising the clinical trial landscape in Australia.
However, through our experience, we have identified the following challenges within our remit to address:
Through collaboration among states and territories, we have the opportunity to create "patient-centered" and "workforce-enabling" uniform satellite site activation processes. These processes will leverage national mutual acceptance of ethics, mutual acceptance of primary site approvals, supervision plan templates, and cluster sub-contracts. Sponsor organizations such as AGITG have already started including "teletrial" as a recruitment method within their protocols. With continued industry and ACTA partnerships, we hope this will become routine practice.
The Commonwealth's One Stop Shop will serve as an enabling platform to harmonize processes across Australia, while the National Clinical Trial Governance Framework will guide health services to incorporate trials as routine practice in service delivery. Additionally, collaboration with national and international clinical peak bodies, including the Clinical Oncology Society of Australia, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, and the European Cancer Organisation, will strengthen our advocacy to influence global sponsors and CROs to adopt the teletrial model as a tangible example of a decentralized clinical trial system globally.