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With seemingly unavoidable and unceasing headlines such as “FDA Rolls Out Agentic AI for Staffers,” “How AI is Transforming Clinical Trials,” and “New AI System Could Accelerate Clinical Research” hitting the news feeds every day, it’s no wonder some observers from the trenches of the drug and device development industry want to separate the honest hope from the breathless hype when it comes to how artificial intelligence (AI) is being applied to their everyday working lives. 

Taking an experimental drug is likely the first thing that comes to mind for most people who’ve never participated in human subjects research when the prospect of joining a clinical trial comes up. However, speakers who are getting ready to present a session at the ACRP 2026 conference in Orlando next April say that it’s important for research centers in any community—especially highly diverse and minority-rich communities—to consider offering other types of studies to the populations they serve to help foster trust in clinical trials. 

Striking the ideal balance of planning, executing, and overseeing clinical trials between research sponsors, contract research organization (CRO) personnel, and study site teams is like the proverbial three-legged stool scenario. Shortcomings on the part of any one of the partners can pitch the whole project askew. 

According to Dean Jang, CCRC, a Site Director for IMA Clinical Research in Austin, Texas, far from serving only short-term goals, mentorship is the perfect vehicle for (among other purposes) providing a transparent career ladder that outlines clear internal growth paths. These paths are ideally aimed at retaining new clinical research coordinators and other incoming study team members beyond what may be accelerated, sink-or-swim training periods at highly active sites. 

While having members of clinical trial teams take specimens from and record data about study participants can become a familiar feature of measuring their progress through a trial to researchers and patients alike, none of them may be thinking at the time about how those physical and digital leftovers can have an afterlife in later research.