title: Conducting Clinical Trials in the Public Schools.
abstract: This manuscript explores the general whys and hows clinicians in the public school can and should be involved in clinical trials research and describes the Communication Sciences and Disorders Research Group (CSDRG). The CSDRG is a group of clinicians, clinical investigators, basic scientists, epidemiologists, and statisticians in communication sciences and disorders (funded by the National Institutes of Health) who came together to design and implement clinical trials examining the effectiveness of interventions with speech, hearing, language, balance, and voice/swallowing disorders. Clinical trials are a very specific type of treatment research requiring the randomization of children to several different treatment arms. Because of the required characteristics of clinical trials, conducting them in the school setting poses unique challenges and logistic issues that are described, along with potential solutions.
authors.affiliation: JCT, Inc., Gaithersburg, MD.
authors.forename: Tom
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: O'Toole
authors.affiliation: Northwestern University, Evanston, IL.
authors.forename: Jeri A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Logemann
authors.affiliation: American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, Rockville, MD.
authors.forename: Herbert M
authors.initials: HM
authors.lastname: Baum