Premier Research doubles in-house clinical testing capacity
The move will enable the clinical development service provider to make its first foray into outpatient trials, and will increase its pharmacokinetic (PK) sampling capabilities with new overnight facilities for patients.
Both sites will work primarily in the areas of healthy normal volunteers, acute and chronic pain, rheumatology, and neuroscience. They each feature operating rooms, surgery suites, PK freezers, processing labs and ten cardiac telemetry units.
CEO Ludo Reynders said the new facilities are a bid to meet the rising customer demand for its services, which range from proof-of-concept Phase I studies, right the way through the spectrum to Phase IV post-marketing trials.
He told Outsourcing-Pharma: “This development allows us to expand our activities in other therapeutic areas and indications where we have been gaining significant experience both in a controlled Phase I setting as well as in a variety of outpatient settings and populations.”
Mike Kuss, VP of analgesia for the company, added: “We are expanding in response to increased customer demand for our clinic services.”
One-stop-shop
Kuss told us the move will allow the firm to provide a more complete and speedier service to customers, because of the large range of provisions available from one site.
He said: “Each site is able to perform rapid, proof-of-concept, dose-ranging, single or multiple-dose studies.
“We now have the capability in all of our facilities to house patients overnight in early phase studies where pharmacokinetic sampling is quite important.”
Kuss added that the Phoenix centre also has a pharmacy which can prepare and compound study drugs on site.
The new provisions add to the business' existing capabilities in acute and chronic pain, rheumatology, and neuroscience studies.
