2023 SCOPE: It’s an Orlando Thing

First off, Happy New Year! Our January/February is a single issue, thus the reason for its arrival in your inbox in February. The Applied Clinical Trials team just got back from SCOPE, the Summit for Clinical Operations Executives annual meeting and it was a great event. In three words…we are back.

There were over 3,200 attendees at this year’s event, which was not the first one in person since COVID, but the overall mood and appetite for learning, sharing, and networking was off the charts. Appropriately, many of the sessions presented what was learned during COVID and how those learnings should be woven back into said area.

There is also an increased sense of urgency that industry needs to streamline processes and optimize trials for lower overall drug development costs, as well as to answer those efficacy questions on investigational drugs faster.

This year, SCOPE launched its Best in Show awards, which allowed attendees to vote on the best new products in the clinical trials and research space. Thirty-five companies exhibiting at the event entered nearly 40 new products launched since February 2022. This year’s winners are in alphabetical order: Anju Software’s TA Scan 6 (now with integrated diversity data); EmVenio’s Community Research Sites; Medidata’s myMedidata App (v1); StudyKIK’s StudyCash, and uMotif’s eCOA/ePRO and Engagement Platform.

There was plenty of knowledge and intel to share with the larger clinical trials community, which Applied Clinical Trials will do throughout the year, but check out the reports on the Industry Trends topic of our site. These include DE&I, which is moving the needle toward implementation and best practices; AI/ML; how CROs can work more effectively with smaller biopharma; ESG is not only for executives—impacts on climate and society are alive and well in the clinical trials industry; and many more.

Now, the headline…if SCOPE moves out of Orlando, this headline will not age well (I’m not starting rumors here, I heard no such thing). But it’s not “What Happens in Orlando Stays in Orlando.” Who wants that? Our industry needs to share and collaborate. And SCOPE was just the place to reiterate that fact.

Lisa Henderson is Editor-in-Chief of Applied Clinical Trials and can be reached at lhenderson@mjhlifesciences.com.