Increasing Diversity in Clinical Trials: Our Summer Intern Challenge

Blog Posts  |  18 August 2022

Written by: Alicea Starr

Every year, Allscripts and Veradigm summer interns engage in a cross-departmental team activity to address a challenge facing the medical industry. With health equity becoming an increasingly high priority in health care, we decided to ask our 2022 Summer Intern class to address this topic.

The challenge was to create a plan to increase diversity in clinical drug and medical trials. Over the course of 3 months, each team worked together to research and understand the challenges inherent in this topic and to come up with a creative solution using the tools available within the company. On July 29, 2022 the teams presented their cases to a panel of four executive leaders who selected the winning team.

The leadership team was thrilled by the impressive collection of ideas and solutions proposed by the teams, that ranged from building tools within our existing software to creating social media and advertising strategies, as well as engaging with the U.S. Government and creating alliances with nonprofit organizations.

“We are all feeling more secure about our future knowing all of you are going to be out there doing really cool things in the world,” said Lisa Hammond, Chief Human Resources Officer, on behalf of the judges. Choosing a winner was difficult, as each team helped spark great new ideas.

Ultimately, the judges selected team “AllTrials” for their thoughtful, practical, and well-researched presentation that, among other ideas, involved building trust within the demographics targeted by increasing the company’s charitable presence in these communities.

Through our charitable giving program, we are working toward creative ways to advance health equity through partnerships with nonprofit organizations by using their expertise to address the issues head-on. As a healthcare company, we believe that it is our duty to help ensure everyone has access to quality medical care. We appreciate the additional perspective that creating partnerships that support communities we serve can provide a dual benefit of building trust to help marginalized groups receive the life-saving treatments they need.

You can learn more about our work in increasing diversity in clinical trials, and look for our upcoming blog series on how Allscripts and Veradigm are advancing health equity through our charitable partnerships.

Congratulations to all our Summer Interns for their important work on this challenge. We look forward to seeing everything you do in the future to advance healthcare for all.

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Tags
clinical trial   intern   diversity in clinical trials   health equity  

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