MedPharmics has sites located in Metairie, Louisiana; Phoenix, Arizona; Gulfport, Mississippi; and Albuquerque, New Mexico. All sites are strategically located in large metropolitan areas and have easy access to municipal airports and ample hotel accommodations. In the unlikely event of a medical emergency, nurses and physicians have appropriate emergency training and access to resuscitative equipment and medications. All sites are also in close proximity to a hospital with ER facilities. We have an inpatient unit at our central site in Louisiana with plans to open a second inpatient unit in Mississippi. For this reason, we are able to conduct trials for drugs in all stages of development – Phase I through Phase IV. All sites can address a wide range of clinical indications including vaccines, women’s health, diabetes, hyperlipidemia, hypertension, congestive heart failure, COPD, cigarette smoking, and migraines. Because practicing physicians are a key component at each site, we are able to develop extensive, databases of reliable subjects. Because contracts and budgets are negotiated through our central office, the sponsor’s administrative work is streamlined and costs are thereby reduced. Oversight and uniformity of all sites are maintained by frequent visits of senior staff, including a quality assurance specialist.

Visiting clinical research associates are provided a quiet, private room with access to internet service, copying machine, and fax.

The staff hierarchy is similarly structured at each site. At the apex of each site is a PI who oversees the trials, ensuring both subject safety and data integrity. The PIs are well-established, practicing physicians and highly respected members of the local medical community. Because of this extensive network of personal relationships among colleagues, MedPharmics’ PIs have been able to closely collaborate with specialists who identify potential subjects and may also serve as sub-investigators providing support to the PI through specific expertise in a given sub-specialty. Other team members include nurse practitioners, registered nurses, licensed practical nurses, certified clinical research coordinators, quality compliance and assurance specialists, a marketing team with trained research recruiters, regulatory specialists, data entry assistants, and information technologists.

Through Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI), our team maintains the competency standards of Good Clinical Practice and the International Council for Harmonisation (GCP/ICH). We also maintain training through the International Air Transport Association (IATA). All team members are certified in Basic Cardiac Life Support. Physicians and nurses are also certified in Advanced Cardiac Life Support.

The success of our sites is tight teamwork based upon the mutual respect of our staff members. At the same time, everyone, no matter what his or her station happens to be, knows that there is no place for “ego” when subject safety is the primary goal. Everyone has, not only the right but the responsibility, to voice safety concerns and verify that they are completely addressed.