Clinical Trial Patient Recruitment Rate
Percentage of target patient enrolment achieved within the planned recruitment period
What is Clinical Trial Patient Recruitment Rate?
Clinical trial patient recruitment rate is the percentage of the target number of patients that have been enrolled in a trial. It shows how well a study is progressing towards having enough participants.
Slow recruitment is one of the biggest causes of delay in clinical trials, adding time and cost to bringing a treatment to patients.
How this KPI is measured
- Function
- Product & Engineering
- Sub-function
- Clinical Trials
- Industry
- Pharma & Life Sciences
- Type
- Leading
- Impact
- Operational
- Unit
- %
- Measurement frequency
- Monthly
- Formula
- (Patients enrolled / Target enrolment) × 100
How to calculate it
Divide patients enrolled by target enrolment, and multiply by 100.
For example, if a trial has enrolled 240 of a target 400 patients, the rate is 60%.
Compare with the planned recruitment timeline, and track by site, since some sites recruit far faster than others.
Where it is used
Tracking trial progress
See if enrolment is on plan.
Managing sites
Find slow and fast recruiters.
Forecasting timelines
Estimate completion.
How to improve it
Tips and common mistakes
- Recruitment must always follow ethical and regulatory requirements.
- Retention of participants matters too.
- Review eligibility criteria that may be too strict.
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