What is clinical research and why is it done?

Clinical research is medical research that studies people to understand health and disease. Clinical research helps improve the way doctors treat and prevent illness. Through clinical research, researchers learn:

• How the body works
• How illness develops in people, such as how diseases get better or worse over time
• How the body handles a possible treatment
• Which behaviors help people stay healthy and prevent illness, and which behaviors raise the chance of illness

The goal is to use science to improve people's health care and health over time. The participants who join and take part in clinical research studies may or may not get any benefit for themselves.

What are the types of clinical research?

There are 2 main types of clinical research:

• Clinical trials, also called interventional studies
• Observational studies

Both may try to learn more about an intervention, which may be a drug, behavior, or medical device. The main difference is clinical trial participants are assigned to get an intervention, but observational study participants are not assigned to get an intervention.

Source: U.S. NIH ClinicalTrials https://clinicaltrials.gov/study-basics/learn-about-studies