Research

At NCBI and the NCI Clinical Research Foundation we have 26 years of experience designing, conducting, and
publishing clinical neuroscience research studies.

At The NeuroCognitive & Behavioral Institute, we have offered access to clinical trials to our patients over the past 3 decades.  For some of our patients, these clinical trials gave them access to treatments for disease such as Alzheimer’s and Frontotemporal diseases when no other effective treatments options were available.

Clinical research is a critical pathway in the development of new diagnostic tools and more effective treatments for patients. Historically, clinical research, which is sometimes referred to as clinical trials or clinical research studies, has been conducted at academic medical centers. If your doctor was not affiliated with these centers and not aware of these trials, you, like most patients, would not have considered treatment options through a clinical trial. At NCBI, our patients have access to relevant clinical trials as a possible treatment option for their central and autonomic nervous system related condition being conducted at NCBI.

What is a clinical study?

In a clinical trial, participants receive specific interventions according to the research plan or protocol created by the investigators or the sponsors of the trial. These interventions can be drugs or medical devices, specific therapeutic procedures such as a new form of psychotherapy, or changes to participants’ behavior, such as diet. Clinical trials may compare a new treatment to a standard one that is already available, to a placebo that contains no active ingredients, or to no intervention. Some clinical trials compare interventions that are already available to each other. When a new product or approach is being studied, it is not usually known whether it will be helpful, harmful, or no different than available alternatives (including no intervention). The investigators try to determine the safety and efficacy of the intervention by measuring certain outcomes in the participants. For example, investigators may give a drug or other treatment to participants who have high blood pressure to see whether their blood pressure decreases.

Clinical trials used in drug development are sometimes described by phase. These phases are defined by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and range from Phase I through Phase IV.

Who conducts clinical studies?

Every clinical study is led by a principal investigator. Clinical studies also have a research team that may include doctors, clinical research coordinators, nurses, and other health care professionals.

Clinical studies can be investigated initiated meaning the researcher initiated the studied and sometimes seeks sponsorship for the study.  Studies can also be sponsored or funded by pharmaceutical companies, academic medical centers, voluntary groups, and other organizations. In addition, Federal agencies such as the National Institutes of Health, the U.S. Department of Defense, and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs fund studies.

For more details, visit clinicaltrials.gov

Our clinical research units are located inside our clinics throughout New Jersey.  Our clinical research units are an integral part of the comprehensive clinical services we offer to our patients.  A variety of research studies are being conducted studying the effects of new neurodiagnostic techniques and treatments for patients with cognitive, neurobehavioral, and neuropsychiatric disorders.