Beware of “clinical Trials” Scams in Which You Are Asked to Pay Money for Unverified Treatments.
Clinical trials are how we test new drugs and treatments, and they can be a boon for patients: if current treatments haven’t worked for you, you can help you experience new ones. And as a thank you for being a guinea pig, your medical expenses have been paid, and you might even get some extra compensation.
But sketchy stem cell clinics are now using the National Institutes of Health’s clinical trial registry, ClinicalTrials.gov , as a platform to advertise their high-value services. Ars Technica reports here the results of an analysis published in Regenerative Medicine that points to problematic studies found on the site.
The registry is still valid – it’s an important way for scientists to keep track of trials – but some of the listings come from stem cell clinics that charge patients for participation and don’t have FDA approval to test their treatments. Some describe themselves with words like “patient funded,” while others don’t explain what you have to pay until you sign up for a trial.
Paid research is fraught with ethical problems and often fails to produce good scientific results anyway. They don’t usually get published in peer-reviewed journals, they don’t compare treatments to placebos (after all, nobody pays thousands for a fake treatment), and sometimes scientific research is never done.
Problem lists include research by the Ageless Regenerative Institute, Cell Surgical Network, Kimera Society Inc, Retina Associates from South Florida, MD Stem Cells, and StemGenix. StemGenix is currently facing a fraudulent lawsuit and three people lost their eyesight earlier this year after they paid US Stem Cell $ 5,000 for stem cell therapy, which was listed in a clinical trial.
There is no surefire way to avoid questionable clinics, but it is best to beware of “clinical trials” that ask you to pay for treatment.