Failed clinical trials

Failed clinical trials and clinical trial fails: how to search the evidence

People often search for failed clinical trials or clinical trial fails when they want to know why a program stopped. The useful answer is usually not one record, but a structured view of status, phase, sponsor, disease area, intervention, and stop reason.

What people mean by failed clinical trials

The phrase failed clinical trials is broad. It can mean a drug did not work, a safety signal emerged, enrollment was not feasible, or the sponsor stopped development. The database keeps these possibilities separate so the word failure does not hide the actual reason.

For search and analysis, the first step is to identify stopped trials. The second step is to interpret the stop reason carefully.

Why failure language is hard to search

Registry records do not use one standard phrase. A failed endpoint, futility recommendation, strategic discontinuation, or safety concern may all appear in different wording. This makes keyword search alone unreliable.

The Clinical Trial Failures app lets you combine keyword search with reason buckets and structured filters, which makes it easier to find relevant records without reading thousands of entries manually.

From broad search to trial-level review

A good workflow starts with the broad dataset, filters to a status or reason bucket, compares sponsors or disease areas, then opens individual trial pages for context.

This is especially useful for competitive intelligence, diligence, portfolio research, and scientific landscape reviews.

Original dataset signals

Likely biological failures in the dataset

For this page, the strongest original-data view is the subset classified as likely biological failure. These are records where the stop language points toward efficacy/futility or safety rather than enrollment, funding, strategy, or operations.

Biological-failure records1,813

Stopped trials classified as efficacy/futility or safety signals.

Efficacy/futility1,096

The larger scientific-failure bucket in this subset.

Safety717

Records where safety or risk-benefit language drove the classification.

Top phases in biological failures

Phase 2
970
Phase 3
493
Phase 1
430
Phase 4
85

Largest disease areas

Oncology
581
Other
385
Infectious disease
144
Gastroenterology and hepatology
140

Example records to verify

NCT07014735

Effect of Hyperglycaemia and Moxifloxacin on QTc Interval in T2DM

Efficacy/futility

A direct futility stop signal, useful for users searching for failed clinical trials where the registry language points to scientific performance.

Open trial record
NCT05999968

Abemaciclib plus darolutamide in prostate cancer after initial treatment

Efficacy/futility

The trial record connects termination to a related study missing its primary endpoint, making it relevant to program-level failure research.

Open trial record
NCT04867837

OCTAPLEX in patients with acute major bleeding on DOAC therapy

Efficacy/futility

The stop language references futility at interim analysis, a common phrase pattern in likely biological-failure records.

Open trial record

The biological-failure subset is a screening layer over ClinicalTrials.gov records. A record can still require publication, protocol, endpoint, and sponsor-disclosure review before being treated as a definitive failed trial.

Frequently asked questions

What is the difference between a failed trial and a stopped trial?

A stopped trial has a registry status such as terminated, suspended, or withdrawn. A failed trial is an interpretation that depends on the stop reason and context.

Does this database include withdrawn trials?

Yes. The database focuses on stopped trial records, including terminated, suspended, and withdrawn trials where available.

Can I search by sponsor or disease area?

Yes. The Explore page supports sponsor, phase, disease area, intervention, status, and reason-based filtering.