There are about 3491 clinical studies being (or have been) conducted in Singapore. The country of the clinical trial is determined by the location of where the clinical research is being studied. Most studies are often held in multiple locations & countries.
Nurse-physician communication skills can be improve through inter-professional team training. Simulation is often used to conduct these training. However, constraints to conduct these sessions such as scheduling and logistic arrangements have been widely reported. Thus with the advancement of technology in education, the use of virtual environment to conduct the team training is being explored and evaluated.
Stroke patients have limited hand mobility post-stroke, thus inhibiting them from performing daily functional tasks independently, resulting in reduced quality of life. Current hand rehabilitation robotic devices are typically driven by rigid linkages/joints, which subject the fingers into a single plane of motion that is unnatural and uncomfortable. These devices belong to the class of continuous passive motion (CPM) devices that only promote hand range-of-motion, but do not require the patient to play an active role in performing the hand exercises. There is a strong need for a device that can resolve the lack of compliant robot-assisted hand motion and lack of intuitive user control in assistive and rehabilitation processes. This proposed research aims to fill the above-mentioned gaps for current hand rehabilitation devices by developing a soft robotic glove that provides compliant assistance to bidirectional hand motion, coupled with intuitive user control. In the short term, the robotic glove will likely enhance the patients' hand flexion-extension range of motion and improve the neuro-motor control of the hand. In the long term, the robotic glove will act as an adjunct to therapists, thereby raising productivity in the presence of growing manpower constraints and optimizing therapy time for the patients; this can potentially enhance recovery time and quality of life, as a result of improved hand mobility for common daily tasks.
Hospital-at-home models seek to address the impending shortage of hospital beds by reimagining the way we deliver acute hospital-level care - substituting the ward for a patient's home. Such programmes have been well established in other countries such as Australia, Europe and USA to be a less costly way to provide inpatient care as a result of a reduction of fixed costs of building and running hospitals, with equivalent variable costs and comparable clinical outcomes. Acute services are provided at home, including regular visits by doctors, nurses and therapists, intravenous therapy, simple investigations and 24/7 access to doctors. The clinical service is tech-enabled, by remote monitoring and telecommunication technologies. Although overseas experience suggests that hospital-at-home programmes are an effective, safe and scalable substitute for inpatient beds, and promising strategy to meet the bed demands of our ageing population, the outcomes in the local environment is unclear. Singapore has a unique healthcare system compared to primarily insurance driven (USA) or publicly funded (UK and Australia), which favours subsidies of inpatient care compared to community-based care. In addition, cultural beliefs of hospitals as a source of comfort and healing and unfamiliarity with healthcare providers performing home visits may provide unique challenges which may affect outcomes of a hospital-at-home programme in Singapore. In an Asian setting, family and informal caregivers are heavily involved in the care of patients and may pose unique barriers and facilitators to such care at home that may not be evident in similar models in Western countries. This study aims to evaluate the effectiveness, feasibility and processes of a new hospital-at-home programme in Singapore.
Haemorrhoids or piles are the most common colorectal condition in the local population. Patients often present with bleeding with bowel movement or anal discomfort, both of which causes significant anxiety and stress. For symptomatic sizeable piles, the treatment of choice still remains the conventional open excision (COH). However, this technique carries with it a significant risk of bleeding and pain immediately after the operation, leading to some period of discomfort for the patients. The laser haemorrhoidoplasty procedure (LAH) has been shown in preliminary studies to have less pain, and less complications compared to COH. This study aims to directly compare these two techniques in a local Asian population. The investigators would be conducting a single-centre RCT simultaneously comparing the conventional open Milligan-Morgan haemorrhoidectomy (COH) and the laser haemorrhoidoplasty procedure (LAH) for the treatment of symptomatic grade ll-lV haemorrhoids. Primary outcomes will be post-operative pain while secondary outcomes include post-operative bleeding, readmission and/or reoperations, haemorrhoid-related quality of life (QoL) results and recurrence of symptoms up to a year post procedure
This study aims to develop a cost-effective screening strategy for the Singapore population by targeted screening of people who have a high risk of stomach cancer, in order to detect early signs of the disease at a stage that can be prevented or cured. Often, patients only consult their doctors when they have advanced symptoms, by which time the cancer may be at a difficult to treat, or incurable stage. Using costs in the Singapore health system as well as local population risk profiles and demographics, our previous study demonstrated that screening of high-risk groups is cost-effective and a panel of serum makers was effective in differentiating high-risk from low-risk individuals. This study aims to validate the predictive value of various blood biomarkers, such as that of antibodies against Helicobacter pylori, pepsinogen levels, micro RNAs (miRNAs) and blood-based protein markers in participants who have been scheduled to undergo upper gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopy for clinical reasons. If successful, the marker can be used to stratify population into different risk groups and various screening systems can be provided according to different risk level. This will reduce the number of annual invasive screening examinations required to detect early gastric cancer (GC), thereby rendering it cost-effective to generalize as clinical practice in Singapore.
Prospective multi-center single-blinded randomized controlled trial (RCT) investigating the safety and feasibility of the SELUTION SLR™ (Sustained Limus Release) 018 drug eluting balloon (DEB) for the treatment of failed AV fistula in renal dialysis patients. Patients will be randomised to either SELUTION SLR or POBA.
This proposal details the implementation of an international (Singapore and New Zealand) multi-centre study to test a novel therapeutic strategy aimed at reducing the burden of atrial fibrillation - an important medical condition with major healthcare implications. Unique aspects of this study include i) a non-arrhythmic treatment target (mineralocorticoid receptor antagonism) -targeting the arrhythmogenic substrate of AF before it becomes permanently established, ii) the use of pacemaker monitoring capability to accurately document AF burden, thus increasing the power of the study and iii) multi-national collaborative, double blind design.
This study is designed to assess the effects of 1) the emulsification 2) the type of dietary fat on carotenoid (CAT) absorption employing an in-vitro digestion system (Proof of Concept) and well-designed randomized controlled trial.
Resono Ophthalmic has developed Rexo-Eye in 2014, a QMR-based patented instrument which is hypothesised to stimulate physiological cellular regeneration and reactivate the tear system by stimulating and reactivating the lacrimal system, induce mild hyperthermia and massage effects which reactivate the tear and lipid secretion, targeting all arms of pathogenic mechanisms of dry eye disease. By improving cell migration and cell health, eye surface epithelial problems in dry eyes which are hard to reverse could hopefully be improved. It has been marked since 2016 as a medical device for the treatment of ocular surface disorders and patented in Italy and Europe, with other international patents pending. In this study, we aim to assess the efficacy and safety of Rexon-Eye in dry eye patients.
Assessment of safety and efficacy of tissue-engineered corneal endothelial graft material generated using cultured human corneal endothelial cells for tissue-engineered endothelial keratoplasty (TE-EK).