Conducting Research During an Infectious Disease Outbreak
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During any infectious disease outbreak, multiple questions arise about the origin of the outbreak and the factors associated with its spread. Much research during an outbreak focuses on understanding the clinical course of the infection in different populations, how an infection is spreading, who is at risk, and what control measures are effective to reduce spread. For the acute care of patients, understanding the most effective treatments are key.
- Do the treatments already exist?
- What can be used effectively for the new disease?
- Are treatments already being studied at different stages of development in the lab, in animal models, or in humans?
- Do completely new treatments need to be developed?
Understanding what patient factors predict the risk for poor outcomes allows healthcare systems to place patients in the proper environment for successful care.
Do the questions, and the research, differ if it’s a novel disease, such as the 2019-NCoV?
For a novel infectious disease, the basic public health questions about preventing spread rise to the top priority, in addition to finding promising treatments that might benefit patients who are already ill. As we are seeing with the 2019-NCoV, scientists are assessing whether some of the countermeasures that were being considered for other coronaviruses, such as SARS and MERS, might have effectiveness against 2019-NCoV. See updates about 2019-NCoV.
What are the obstacles to conducting this research?
In the current environment, one big obstacle is getting the “ground truth” from credible sources who have real data on the new infectious disease, the clinical course, and how a disease is spreading. Other obstacles include getting access to limited patient samples in order to test possible diagnostic tests, treatments and vaccines.
Overcoming the obstacles: The work of NETEC and the Special Pathogen Research Network:
NETEC/SPRN has a central IRB and pre-arranged agreements with its 10 partner facilities in key response regions of the country. This allows for more rapid sharing of a single protocol and data for a common research platform that all facilities can follow. This does not completely remove all the paperwork, as data-use agreements between institutions still need to be executed, but the IRB is a significant hurdle that can be bridged. In addition, the sites can share information on the latest challenges and information from partner sites.