Clinical Trials

What Are Clinical Trials?

Clinical trials are medical research where doctors use experimental new drugs or treatments on patients. The treatments have not been conclusively proven safe and effective, but they are only approved for testing on patients if the evidence to date suggests that they are.

Cardiothoracic surgery is changing quickly, as surgeons find ways to repair the heart and lungs through smaller incisions and often in older patients. Stanford pioneers many of these new approaches. Sometimes we serve as one of several sites in a national or regional clinical trial. We also host clinical trials led by our own faculty members.



Explore your options

There is a lot of information available about clinical trials. We encourage you to do research on your own and discuss your options with family members and doctors.

ClinicalTrials.gov lists all of the ongoing clinical trials in the United States. The information can be very scientific, but it is a good place to start to build a list of questions for your doctors.

Questions?