Key Takeaways
- Strategic Collaboration: Sano Genetics, 20/20 Onsite, and Clinical Enrollment have partnered to provide end-to-end solutions for IRD patient care and research.
- Streamlined Enrollment: The partnership integrates genetic testing, mobile eye assessments, and concierge recruitment to accelerate clinical trial timelines.
- Improved Access: Mobile vision clinics and at-home solutions will reach underserved and rural populations across the USA.
- Comprehensive Support: Patients receive genetic counseling, educational resources, and logistical support throughout their diagnostic journey.
- Efficiency for Sponsors: The unified approach reduces costs and complexity for clinical trial sponsors by coordinating multi-channel engagement and testing.
The collaboration brings together genomics and clinical trials specialist Sano Genetics, the leading provider of mobile eye assessments for clinical research 20/20 Onsite, and concierge patient recruitment expert Clinical Enrollment. Together, the three organizations will create a coordinated pathway to support patients affected by IRDs, combining in-person ophthalmic screening, at-home genetic testing, and digital patient engagement within a single process. The goal is to enable patients to undergo specialized screening and genetic testing for their condition and to connect to appropriate clinical research.
Sano Genetics' technology platform will coordinate genetic testing and counseling for IRD patients, while providing a digital environment with resources to support and educate patients throughout their diagnosis and research journey. This is particularly important because emerging gene therapies for conditions like retinitis pigmentosa and Leber congenital amaurosis require confirmed genetic variants for eligibility, making accurate genetic testing a prerequisite for access to treatment.
Clinical Enrollment will recruit and screen patient pipelines using curated content delivered via targeted digital advertising, manage the retrieval of medical records, and provide concierge services to help patients with logistics. 20/20 Onsite will provide in-person patient screening through their onsite ophthalmic delivery models, including mobile vision clinics.
All three partners will support patient recruitment for relevant clinical trials.
IRDs are a group of progressive conditions in which at least one gene fails to work correctly, altering the structure and function of the retina and impairing vision. These conditions can affect people of any age, though vision loss often manifests in childhood. Many IRDs are degenerative, meaning some people will live with worsening vision impairment or blindness for their entire lives.
Common inherited retinal diseases include retinitis pigmentosa, in which retinal cells that sense light gradually die, leading to night blindness and progressive peripheral vision loss; Leber congenital amaurosis, which causes severe vision problems as early as infancy; and Stargardt disease, which damages the macula and leads to central vision loss, often beginning in childhood. Over 260 genes have been associated with inherited retinal diseases, making accurate genetic diagnosis a critical step in determining both care options and eligibility for emerging therapies, including gene therapy.
Recruiting participants for IRD trials requires complex multi-channel patient engagement, ophthalmology exams, and genetic testing. Because genetic testing is essential both for accurately diagnosing the specific condition and for determining eligibility for gene therapies and clinical trials, these steps must be tightly coordinated. When they are managed separately, through disconnected vendors and workflows, timelines extend, costs increase, and patients who are waiting for access to new treatments may fall through the gaps.
With over 260 genes associated with inherited retinal diseases, identifying and qualifying patients for the right clinical research requires coordination across recruitment, ophthalmic assessment, and genetic testing. This partnership between 20/20 Onsite, Clinical Enrollment, and Sano Genetics brings these capabilities together, reducing the fragmentation that slows enrollment and limits patient access.
For clinical teams, this means shorter timelines and lower coordination costs. For patients, it means a clearer path from screening to genetic testing to research participation. The at-home and mobile delivery model will also create opportunities to engage individuals from all regions of the US, including underserved communities in rural and under-resourced urban areas.
Charlotte Guzzo, Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer, Sano Genetics, comments: “Our partnership with 20/20 Onsite and Clinical Enrollment will bring essential eye care and genetic testing to patients affected by inherited retinal diseases, particularly those in rural areas who often face significant barriers to accessing specialist services. This collaboration brings together the strengths of all three organizations to create a coordinated, patient-centered approach to screening, testing, and research. By integrating our platform with our partners' testing and recruitment capabilities, we aim to reduce time-to-eligibility for IRD patients and give sponsors clearer visibility into where participants are in the screening and qualification process.”
Sonali Bloom, CEO, 20/20 Onsite, comments: “This partnership is a vital step forward in our mission to make critical vision care more accessible and inclusive for all patients including those with inherited retinal diseases. By combining 20/20 Onsite’s point-of-need eye assessments with Sano Genetics’ genetic testing platform and Clinical Enrollment’s patient recruitment expertise, we are accelerating clinical research timelines while reaching more patients who struggle to access clinical research as a care option. Together, we’re expanding access to IRD clinical research for patients in rural and underserved communities who currently have limited access to ophthalmic specialists or genetic testing services.”
Bryan Manning, Founder, Clinical Enrollment, comments: “Having worked in IRD research and advocacy for many years, I see this partnership as a meaningful step toward making enrollment more accessible and operationally coherent for patients who have historically been difficult to reach and retain.”
About Sano Genetics
Sano Genetics' mission is to make precision medicine studies more executable. Despite advances in genomic sequencing over the past decade, precision medicine trials remain complex, resource-intensive, and slow to enrol — and many programmes fail to reach patients who could benefit from them. Sano's 360° platform integrates the full precision medicine pathway — from strategy and patient finding through biomarker screening, engagement, and analytics — giving sponsors a single, connected infrastructure rather than a fragmented set of vendor relationships. The company works with pharmaceutical companies and biotechs to find, screen, and engage participants faster and more cost effectively; with researchers to increase efficiency and impact; and with patient advocacy groups to drive research with and for their communities. Headquartered in Cambridge, UK, Sano’s diverse team combines years of expertise in medical research, genetics and security-focused software engineering.
More information is available at https://www.sanogenetics.com/.
About 20/20 Onsite
20/20 Onsite is a healthcare services company providing clinical trial solutions that are transforming the delivery of vision care by expanding access for patients through mobile vision clinics that bring ophthalmic assessments directly to patients at their location. Their integrated point-of-need service delivery platform has taken high-value eye assessment services directly to patients at work, at school, in neighborhoods, and at clinical research sites. During the pandemic, 20/20 Onsite began bringing ophthalmic assessments to patients in clinical trials or post-marketing safety surveillance programs across the country, increasing access to clinical research. By delivering ophthalmic assessments at patients' locations rather than requiring travel to fixed clinical sites, 20/20 Onsite supports decentralized trial models and reduces the access burden for participants.
20/20 Onsite has served over 80,000 patients, including 18 clinical trials, has consistently met screening timelines across its clinical trial portfolio, and consistently reports patient NPS scores of over 93.
About Clinical Enrollment
Clinical Enrollment (CE) is a full service patient recruitment company with expertise in clinical trials and approved therapies. With a background in e-commerce and a model committed to putting the needs of patients first, CE is uniquely skilled in reaching specific patient populations and aiding them in their care journey.
Founded by Bryan Manning, who previously led Two Blind Brothers, an IRD-focused charitable company, CE utilizes bespoke content driven by inhouse web design and videography teams, a highly personalized concierge patient recruitment team, and marries the pipeline together using behavioral targeting and algorithm based ad buying strategies.