Exploristics is delighted to announce that its collaboration on the COVASE trial with the Antimicrobial Defence Laboratory at the Francis Crick Institute London led by Dr Veni Papayannopoulos, Director of Translation Research at the Crick Dr Veronique Birault, UCH Respiratory Consultant Professor Joanna Porter and Early-Stage Development Consultant Dr Pauline Lukey has won the prestigious Sir David Cooksey Prize for Translation in Science for 2021. The trial evaluating the cystic fibrosis drug Dornase alfa as a treatment for COVID-19 was run by University College London and the Francis Crick Institute. Study design during clinical protocol development and statistical analysis for this trial was carried out Dr Aiden Flynn and Dr Jamie Inshaw at Exploristics with funding provided by LifeArc.
To support the study, Exploristics conducted a literature review to gather information on the options for the primary endpoint and performed further evaluation to identify the analysis strategy that gave the best chance of success. Given the urgency of COVID-19 research due to the ongoing global pandemic, Exploristics explored a range of design options that would generate clinical evidence in the most efficient way. This led to the implementation of a novel, hybrid design which integrated historical control data with data from a prospectively designed randomised, controlled study.