The State has saved about €6.5 million in treatment costs through a sample of 38 cancer clinical trials, accessed by 230 patients over the last year, according to a new report from Cancer Trials Ireland.
Twenty of these trials resulted in inward investment of €6.76 million by pharmaceutical companies, the Value of Cancer Trials 2 report also found.
When a patient enrols on a cancer clinical trial, the patient’s treatment costs such as medicines, imaging, blood and other tests, as well as biopsies and procedures, are generally paid for by the trial sponsor. Where this happens, there is no cost to the patient, their health insurer or the State.
In the 12-month period from September 1st, 2025, to August 31st, 2026, 3,938 patients took part in cancer trials, of which 702 were on interventional trials, including 423 on ‘drug’ trials.
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There are currently 160 cancer trials open across Ireland, with lymphoma and haematology cancer trials being the most common, followed by genitourinary, breast and lung cancer trials.
Seventy-three pharmaceutical industry-sponsored clinical trials across all disease areas opened in Ireland in 2025, compared with 51 in 2024 and 41 in 2023, according to the Irish Pharmaceutical Healthcare Association Clinical Trials Activity Comparison Report 2026.
Despite this growth, Ireland ranked 14th of 27 European Union member states for industry-sponsored clinical trials per capita last year, improving from 18th in 2024.
A new survey of attitudes to cancer trials also found that eight in 10 would like to see more trials taking place in Ireland (up 10 per cent since 2024). Two in 10 know someone who has taken part in a clinical trial, while close to three-quarters would be willing to take part in one.
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The survey of 1,000 people across the country took place in July 2026.
Prof Seamus O’Reilly, clinical lead of Cancer Trials Ireland, said while it is known that cancer clinical trials lead to improved patient outcomes “we could be doing so much more to get more trials up and running here”.
“In addition to tackling issues such as protected research time, security of tenure for research staff and the streamlining of processes, I think it is also key that the health service be given targets for trials,” he said.
“As clinicians, we have key performance indicators when it comes to seeing patients in a timely manner and getting them on treatment.
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“We need that accountability to enable us to improve patient outcomes. Equally, our health system also needs a similar key performance indicator to allow transparency regarding equity of access to trials, to enable us to identify barriers and facilitators to that access, and to emphasise to all stakeholders that clinical trials are an integral, outcome-improving aspect of cancer care and a necessary component of how we care for patients with cancer in Ireland.”
