Apple's ResearchKit Mobile Apps Make Strides in Clinical Research, But Is iPhone User Demographics an Issue?

As reported in the trade media, GSK developed an iPhone app for use in "clinical research" (read "GSK Develops Rheumatoid Arthritis App for Clinical Trial Using Apple's ResearchKit"). It is claimed that this "[marks] the first time a drugmaker has used the health system for the iPhone to conduct clinical research."

ResearchKit is a set of tools for collecting participant consent, conducting surveys and assigning active tasks to participants that they can perform to help researchers achieve specific study goals.

Keep in mind, however, that this use of a ResearchKit iPhone app is not part of a clinical study involving an actual medicine. As reported by GSK here:

"We are the first in our industry to use Apple’s ResearchKit as part of our research, this time looking at the impact a patient’s disease has on their day-to-day life. We’re not testing a medicine right now. The medicines development process starts with learning from real patients by including their insights and health goals into our research. That’s exactly the information we hope to gather about rheumatoid arthritis, a debilitating disease which can impact patients’ lives at many levels.

"The PARADE study will use the iPhone app to conduct surveys and iPhone sensors to collect and track common symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis: joint pain, fatigue, and mood. It will also track activity and quality of life measures for 300 patients over a three-month period."

This is not, however, the first use of Apple's ResearchKit in the development and use of mobile apps for "clinical research."

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