The quality and rationality of many recently registered clinical studies related to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) needs to be assessed. Hence, this study aims to evaluate the current status of COVID-19 related registered clinical trial.
We did an electronic search of COVID-19 related clinical studies registered between December 1, 2019 and February 21, 2020 (updated to May 28, 2020) from the
A total of 1,706 studies were included 10.0% of which (n=171) were from France, 943 (55.3%) used an interventional design, and 600 (35.2%) used an observational design. Most of studies (73.6%) aimed to recruit fewer than 500 people. Interferon was the main prevention program, and antiviral drugs were the main treatment program. Hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine (230/943, 24.4%) were widely studied. Some registered clinical trials are incomplete in content, and 37.4% of the 1,706 studies may have had insufficient sample size.
The quality of COVID-19 related studies needs to be improved by strengthening the registration process and improving the quality of clinical study protocols so that these clinical studies can provide high-quality clinical evidence related to COVID-19.