Dr Lauren Powell: Takeda’s Partnership With Xavier Is a Long-term Investment

When Takeda announced a partnership with Xavier University of Louisiana in April, this was not a one-time deal. As Lauren Powell, MPA, PhD, vice president, US Health Equity & Community Wellness at Takeda, explains in this second part of a series on the partnership, investment in T-REX, the university’s new center for technical research and exchange, will be a long-term investment that’s part of a broader strategy.

For the first segment in the series with The American Journal of Managed Care® (AJMC®), visit ajmc.com.

AJMC®: The Takeda initiative with Xavier University of Louisiana is a multi-year effort. Can you discuss how the partnership will play out from year 1, year 2, and beyond?

Powell: The multi-year partnership here is really important, and an important cornerstone of our approach to health equity. We really believe that this is a long-term effort—this is not just a flash in the pan opportunity. This is not just something that we see as a one-time initiative. Oftentimes, sometimes in this industry, we get into a cycle of just one-time sponsorships; [at Takeda] we really want to invest in long term relationship building—understanding that it will take more than just 1 or 2 years or just a couple of months to actually move the needle on health equity.

And so, in the multi-year partnership that we have established, the first year will actually be [about] getting to know each other. We'll spend some time really learning about Xavier. Xavier will be learning about Takeda as well, and they have the freedom in this space to do some planning around how the T-REX Center will be established, [what] exactly [will be] the focus of that center and some of the exciting other community partnership opportunities they'd like to see pursued. In subsequent years will actually create opportunities for students to have training opportunities at Takeda, and fellowships and internships for the students. Xavier actually has a master's in public health program—with a concentration on health equity—[and] we really are excited to some support some students from there. They also have a School of Pharmacy. And so, Takeda, as you can imagine, is a great place for us to find opportunities for those students to participate in fellowships and other educational opportunities to advance health equity.

We know, as a part of the real need and urgency to diversify clinical trials, we need to make sure we have diverse clinical trials data, diverse principal investigators, and the entire pipeline of what clinical trials require to actually complete and to actually administer and run. And there's so much potential with the students at Xavier. And so, we see opportunities to support education, as we know that also a major social determinant of health—and it’s so important to this industry to continue to diversify.

AJMC®: Can you specifically address the partnership’s goal of reducing resistance to clinical trials among people of color?

Powell: It’s so important that we think about the need to diversify clinical trials. Really, it's a multi-pronged approach that we have to undertake. Part of that is, as I mentioned, thinking about who runs our trials; the other part is how we recruit and retain patients. And what we really are looking forward to—and I'm so excited about working with Xavier on in the T-REX initiative and our health equity multiyear partnership, is how we demystify what it means to participate in a clinical trial.

I actually did my dissertation and doctoral research on ways to increase the participation of minorities in clinical research. And one of the things that I spend a lot of time thinking about—and that I'm looking forward to maybe exploring here—is how do we remake the language around clinical trials? How do we make, just even in the education, the understanding of what clinical trials are so much more accessible to people? [This should be] long before the moment of actually asking them whether or not they'd be willing to enroll. And so those are some of the things we're going to be exploring once there a way for us to work with community members to create a curriculum and to create some ongoing conversations that are not so technical, that are not super scientific, that it's hard for people to understand? And how do we just introduce the potential of clinical trials and the understanding of clinical trials—before the moment of asking whether or not someone will consent to participate? How do we start to normalize this as a part of healthcare—just receiving health care and in pursuing health care in general.