The pre-screening log: tracking and documenting your funnel

47 charts, 23 calls, 8 database matches — and no answers

It is Tuesday morning. The sponsor's clinical research associate has scheduled a recruitment teleconference for Thursday at 2:00 PM Eastern. The email reads: "Please be prepared to discuss your current pipeline, including number of candidates identified by channel, pre-screening outcomes, and projected timeline to enrollment target."

The coordinator knows the work has been happening. Over the past four weeks, the team has reviewed charts from the cardiology panel, fielded incoming calls from the flyer posted in the clinic waiting room, and processed a database query that returned 310 names. People have been contacted. Some were interested. Some were not. A few had disqualifying medications. One had moved out of state. There has been real, productive activity.

But when the coordinator sits down to prepare for Thursday's call, the picture falls apart. How many charts were actually reviewed? The coordinator remembers starting with the "A through D" surnames two Mondays ago, but did not record the total. How many phone contacts resulted in a scheduled screening visit versus a polite decline? The notes are scattered across sticky notes, the back of a printed protocol page, and a half-completed spreadsheet that was abandoned when the formatting became unwieldy. The database query results — the 310 names — are on an institutional shared drive, but which of those 310 have been reviewed, which have been contacted, and which were excluded?

The coordinator cannot answer the sponsor's questions. Not because the work was not done, but because the work was not tracked.

This is the problem the pre-screening log solves. And it is not a minor operational inconvenience. The pre-screening log is classified as an essential record under ICH E6(R3) Appendix C. Its absence is a finding during monitoring visits. Its inaccuracy undermines your ability to manage your own recruitment strategy. And its data — when properly maintained — transforms you from someone who can say "we have been busy" into someone who can say "we have screened 78 candidates across three channels, our chart-to-contact conversion rate is 34%, and at current velocity we will reach our enrollment target by week 12."

That second answer is the one that earns confidence. This lesson teaches you how to produce it.

47 charts, 23 calls, 8 database matches — and no answers

The coordinator cannot answer the sponsor's questions. Not because the work was not done, but because the work was not tracked.

That second answer is the one that earns confidence. This lesson teaches you how to produce it.

47 charts, 23 calls, 8 database matches — and no answers

What you will learn

The pre-screening log: tracking and documenting your funnel

47 charts, 23 calls, 8 database matches — and no answers

What you will learn