I visited a Royal Horticultural Society garden recently, and one of the things the tour guide pointed out resonated with me. There were several newly-planted copses of trees that looked quite thin on the ground. When I asked how long it would take for these trees to become as big as some of the others in the area, I was told it would be over a hundred years.

And it’s this kind of long-term planning that I believe we are missing out on in the world of clinical trials.

Obviously planning for things that will be happening a hundred years from now isn’t going to be especially useful. But having a vision that stretches at least beyond the constraints of the current trial we’re working on, certainly seems like it could be a valuable approach for the industry to be taking.