Press Releases

PHILADELPHIA, PA, UNITED STATES - Dec 14, 2017 - Cascade is a passionate advocate for the site experience and a driving force behind pharma’s ability to transform clinical operations

Philadelphia PA and London UK - Visionary clinical trials technologist and self-professed
“data geek” Elisa Cascade continues to amass industry distinctions as DrugDev , an IQVIA company, announced Cascade’s election to the Association of Clinical Research Professionals (ACRP) Board of Trustees. The volunteer-based, member-elected Board carries out the ACRP’s mission to drive excellence in the conduct of clinical research.

Cascade, who is responsible for the growth and development of the DrugDev Spark™ clinical operations suite, also is the architect of the DrugDev Golden Number, the industry’s universal identifier for site facilities and personnel used by the Investigator Databank, the TransCelerate Investigator Registry, and leading pharma companies and CROs.

With over 25 years of pharma clinical research experience as well as expertise in market research, brand strategy, sales force development, and pricing, Cascade works closely with sponsors and sites to improve clinical trial operations through standardization, industry-wide collaboration, and a beautiful technology experience.

ACRP Executive Director Jim Kremidas said, “We’re delighted to welcome Elisa Cascade to the ACRP Board of Trustees. Throughout her career she’s demonstrated an extraordinary ability to turn her vision of improving clinical operations into reality. We’re thrilled to welcome Elisa and look forward to seeing how her ideas and expertise help enhance the Association, our members’ careers and improve the quality of clinical research conducted around the world.”

Cascade is a passionate advocate of the site experience, and she applies this perspective to ensure the DrugDev Spark interface and features are focused on easing site burden. She also led the creation of the DrugDev Golden Number which facilitates collaboration between sponsors and sites, and enables evidence-based site selection decisions. This universal identifier is recognized as a true game-changer: among other awards, earlier this year it won the coveted Clinical Informatics News Best Practices Award at the prestigious SCOPE Summit for improving trial startup and data management. Today, over one-third of all global, interventional clinical trials sponsored by industry are indexed to the DrugDev Golden Number universal identifier for clinical site facilities and staff.  

Ibs Mahmood, Leader of Clinical Technology, IQVIA, said, “Elisa spends every day at the forefront of change, and the pharma industry is glad of it because she’s consistently developing new ways to collect, use and share data to make the best possible scientific and economic decisions. ACRP’s membership is about to enjoy the enormous benefits of having one of pharma’s most imaginative pragmatists involved in charting a bright course ahead.”

Elisa Cascade said, “Being elected to ACRP’s Board of Trustees by its members is one of the greatest and most humbling honors of my career. My aim is to help sponsors, technology companies, and sites collaborate on making clinical trials more efficient, and I’ve always been grateful for ACRP’s dedication to helping pharma develop standards that raise clinical research and workforce development to new levels of excellence. Every Trustee consistently shows a remarkable dedication to improving clinical trials for researchers and patients, and I look forward to working together to continue ACRP’s mission.”

Cascade’s additional honors include being named one of the PharmaVOICE 100 most influential people in life sciences, being chosen as one of the Medicine Maker Power 100 people changing pharma, and a Philadelphia Business Journal Woman of Distinction and Healthcare Innovator. She is a regular columnist on technology and clinical trials for CenterWatch, and has been published in industry journals including Applied Clinical Trials and the DIA Global Forum. Cascade also is a frequent invited speaker at pharma industry conferences. She has an MBA from The Wharton School and a B.S. with High Honors and High Distinction from the University of Michigan.

About ACRP

ACRP supports clinical research professionals through membership, training and development resources, and certification. Founded in 1976, ACRP is a Washington, DC-based nonprofit organization with more than 13,000 members who work in clinical research in more than 70 countries. ACRP’s vision is that clinical research is performed ethically, responsibly, and professionally everywhere in the world. ACRP’s mission is to promote excellence in clinical research. www.acrpnet.org

About DrugDev

DrugDev, an IQVIA company, helps the world do more trials through industry-wide collaboration, standardization and a beautiful technology experience.  DrugDev Spark™, the unified clinical operations suite, is comprised of proven solutions used by 85 sponsors and CROs on over 2,000 clinical trials to transform the quality and efficiency of clinical trials from startup through closeout. DrugDev Spark is powered by the DrugDev Golden Number, the award-winning universal identifier for global site facilities and investigators used by TransCelerate and the Investigator Databank. Learn why 9 of the top 10 sponsors and 4 of the top 5 CROs trust DrugDev by scheduling a demo of DrugDev Spark at drugdev.com.