On September 30, we submitted our draft protocol, informed consent, and Case Report Forms for our Jordanian MDMA/PTSD research to Principal Investigator Nasser Shuriquie, M.D. and his Jordanian research team, and to Clinquest JO, a Jordanian Contract Research Organization (CRO). We have decided to hire Clinquest JO to monitor the study in order to limit the amount of travel and resources that our U.S. monitoring team would have to expend to travel frequently to Jordan. Furthermore, Clinquest JO helped to establish the Jordanian FDA, are culturally situated to Jordan, and speak Arabic. We are impressed with their quality of work and will be pleased to work with them. Dr. Shuriquie introduced Kamila Novak, Ph.D. of Clinquest JO to MAPS Executive Director Rick Doblin Ph.D. when Rick was in Jordan on August 13, 2009.
On October 20, Rick and Michael Mithoefer, M.D. will go to Amman, Jordan to make a presentation about the research agenda to representatives of the Jordanian FDA, Dr. Shuriquie, Shuriquies co-therapist and others who may be involved in the study. Clinquest JO will bring several clinical research staff from Egypt to hear the presentation. MAPS is excited to be venturing through the doorway to the Arabic research world.
From October 18-23, Michael and Rick will attend the conference “Future Directions in PTSD: Prevention, Diagnosis and Treatment,” put on by the Institute for Advanced Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Michael will present a poster on MAPS MDMA/PTSD pilot study at the conference. Michael and Rick will also meet with Efrat Yasur, founder of Transcom Global, an Israeli CRO. MAPS is hiring Transcom Global to monitor our Israeli MDMA/PTSD study.
