Patients' Attitudes to Unproven Therapies in Treating COVID-19 Merit Evaluation

• Main Authors: Hong-tian Li, Zhi-hao Cheng, Yong-ying Huang, Xi-lin Lv, Yu-bo Zhou, Erdan Dong, Jian-meng Liu
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier 2020-08-01
• Series: The Innovation
• Online Access: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S266667582030028X

Since the outbreak of COVID-19, many randomized controlled trials have been launched to test the efficacy of promising treatments. These trials will offer great promise for future treatment. However, a public health emergency calls for a balance between gathering sound evidence and granting therapeutic access to promising trial drugs as widely as possible. In an electronic survey, we found that 3.9% of the participants preferred to receive an unproven trial drug directly in the hypothetical scenario of mild COVID-19 infection. This percentage increased drastically to 31.1% and 54.2% in the hypothetical scenario of severe and extremely severe infection, respectively. Our survey indicates a likelihood of substantial receptivity of trial drugs among actual patients in severe conditions. From the perspective of deontological ethics, a trial can only be approved when potential benefits of the investigational treatment are presumed to outweigh risks, so compassionate or off-label use of investigational therapies merits evaluation.