eClinical Forum's Autumn Americas Workshop last week at Janssen in PA was terrific! It was so dynamic with participants from so many different eCF members companies presenting, discussing, networking and generally having a good time together. We had participants from Acadia, AiCure, Amgen, Astellas, Bayer, Boehringer Ingelheim, Bristol Myers Squibb, Clario, CSL Behring, Early Access Care, eClinical Solutions, GSK, J&J/Janssen, Medidata, Memorial Sloan Kettering, Merck & Co, Merck KGaA, Safira, and Uniphi. But, still we missed our members who could not attend ... Abbvie, Alexion, Ferring, Oracle, Novartis, Pfizer, Signant Health, and Veeva. I look forward to more collaborating over the winter and to be together in the Spring!

The Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning Team is pleased to announce the public release of theirwhite paper titled "AI state-of-play around clinical research"

The white paper were written by a joint task force from the eClinical Forum and Eucrof.

The Archiving and Decommission Team is pleased to announce the public release of three white papers:

• "The Decommissioning of Computerised Systems Used in Clinical Trials" 
• "Nature of a Distributed Trial Master File ‐ Practical Aspects"
• "Data Formats Used in Clinical Trials"

These white papers were written by a joint task force from EUCROF and the eClinical Forum, with representatives from other industry associations including ECRIN, the ePRO consortium, Medicines for Europe and the RQA.

The eClinical Forum is happy to announce the release of the "Investigator’s signature on electronic Case Report Forms (eCRFs), PR2.1"

About the Best Practice Document: There is increased scrutiny by regulatory agencies on the collection of investigator’s signatures as evidence of the overall oversight on the eCRF is reported to the sponsor.  eClinical Forum PI Signature Working Group was formed in March 2021 to update the best practice document originally issued in 2017 by identifying best practices that are based on compliance to regulatory requirements and on risks such as reputation, credibility, legal liability of the data being used by the sponsor. 

The Regulatory Expert Group is happy to announce the release of the English translation of the JPMA EDC Management Sheet v2.00.  EDC Management Sheet is a tool by which Japan Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices Agency (PMDA) ensures  the computerized system used in clinical trials comply with relevant regulations and guidelines.This is an unofficial translation and made public for anyone to use. Please be advised that the original Japanese version should be used for any disputes.

Medical Informatics (Japan Society for Medical Informatics) article on use of eSRA to assess the requirements of the Japan MHLW's "Guideline on security management for medical information systems."

Several members of the eClinical Forum's Regulatory Advisory Group have published an article in Applied Clinical Trials on "When should audit trail begin?"  It is a discussion of the regulatory history behind audit trails and its interpretation as it relates to clinical research data originating or residing in EDC or eCOA systems.

We welcome feedback! Please send to: REG@eclinicalforum.org 

The Society for Clinical Data Management (SCDM) and eClinical Forum (eCF) Joint Task Force are pleased to announce the publication of an industry position paper “AUDIT TRAIL REVIEW: A KEY TOOL TO ENSURE DATA INTEGRITY” final version based on Industry Feedback.  With various electronic data capture modalities becoming the norm and the growing regulatory focus on data collection traceability, audit trails which capture the who, what, when, and why of electronic data entry and amendments are a critical tool.  This paper outlines an industry perspective on maximizing the value of implementing the targeted, routine review of these extremely large datasets. It provides recommendations on risk-based use cases for audit trail review (ATR) and the corresponding desired reporting criteria, with suggestions on when to use visualizations and exception report listings to generate key, actionable insights.

The EUCROF and eClinical Forum Electronic Informed Consent (eConsent) Joint Task Force are pleased to announce the publication of the eConsent Implementation Guide (version 1). The joint task force was formed in 2019 with a view to look at some of the barriers to adoption of eConsent considering the benefits to stakeholders.

eConsent offers remote electronic options for informing and consenting trial participants of a clinical trial, this being a particularly useful capability especially during the pandemic period when site visits are reduced.

The eClinical Forum is happy to announce the public release of a position paper titled “Decentralized TMF Archives and The Decommissioning Of Computerised Systems Used In Clinical Trials”.  This position paper was written by a joint task force from EUCROF and the eClinical Forum, with representatives from other industry associations including ECRIN, the ePRO consortium, Medicines for Europe and the RQA.

ABOUT THE POSITION PAPER: Following the completion of a clinical trial, the essential documents that make up the TMF (Trial Master File) are retained and archived by the sponsor, the investigator and, in some cases, sub-contractors to the sponsor and/or investigator. The position paper highlights 11 key positions: seven positions concerning the archiving of the TMF and four positions concerning the archiving of the electronic data. These positions address areas where regulatory expectations are not always seen as being aligned with industry practices.