Qualitative In-trial Interviews: Methods, Challenges, and Best Practice

Qualitative in-trial interviews with clinical trial participants are a means of providing rich, in-depth patient experience data to supplement and complement data captured by clinical outcome assessments and other clinical trial efficacy endpoints. Such in-trial interview data can be used to build understanding of disease and treatment experiences, evaluate content validity of clinical outcome assessments, aid interpretation of scores and meaningful changes, inform trial design feasibility and operational considerations, and provide supportive evidence regarding safety, efficacy, and effectiveness. Despite the rapid growth of in-trial interviews as part of clinical development programs in the pharmaceutical industry in recent years, published guidelines regarding the methods, conduct, and implementation of in-trial interviews are scarce. Drawing on published examples and the authors’ experiences of conducting in-trial interview studies, this article provides an overview of best practice methods for implementing this methodology (including considerations for study design, sample size, interview conduct, and analysis) and the value of in-trial interview data to answer specific research questions. Operational and logistical considerations are outlined, including recommendations for country selection, site selection, training and communication, adverse event safety reporting, and data management and handling. Well-designed and carefully implemented in-trial interviews can lead to generation of insightful patient experience data that are truly of value to inform regulators, health technology agencies, clinicians, patients, and caregivers about product attributes and the impact of diseases and treatments on patients’ lives.