ARLG thanks Deborah Collyar, Patient Advocate, for her dedication and service to its INNOVATIONS Working Group. Her contributions and advocacy for patients with antimicrobial resistant infections have been invaluable to our team.

Learn more about Deborah below and hear members of the ARLG INNOVATIONS Working Group express their appreciation and best wishes to Deb.

How long have you worked with the ARLG and what projects are you most proud of?
I’ve worked with ARLG since 2020 as a Patient Advocate in the INNOVATIONS Working Group. My work included project development and implementation on both the Quality of Life (QOL) and the Desirability of Outcome Ranking (DOOR) Task Forces. With decades of experience as a patient and as a Patient Advocate in antibacterial resistance research (primarily oncology and immunotherapy), I was surprised to learn about the many similarities between cancer cells and bacteria, including the ability to evade and resist known treatments.

Topics that I stressed, most of which were adopted by ARLG, included:

• • Thinking beyond the traditional antibacterial design approach (including many discussions about superiority trials in addition to non-inferiority designs)
  • Expanding approaches beyond antibiotics
  • Identifying patient communities who may be at higher risk for infectious disease (ID) and antimicrobial resistance (AMR)
  • Offering input on different patient perspectives and how to incorporate those into clinical trials
  • Setting up focus groups with relevant patient communities
  • Helping design health-related quality of life (HRQoL) studies and setting DOOR parameters for four different ID medical conditions so ARLG can learn how to set up templates, with FDA input, for use in all AMR clinical trials.

The achievement I am most proud of is directing focus to the person with the infection, not the ‘bug in the tube.’ While it’s important to know whether the bacteria are susceptible/resistant, it is also critical to understand more about the person and how their immune system and other heterogeneous factors impact the drug treatments that are used.

“ARLG is grateful for Deb Collyar’s contributions to the Innovations Working Group. For over four years, Deb has kept our efforts laser focused on the patient’s experience in AMR. She has been a valued colleague, and we wish her the best in the future.”

Vance Fowler, MD, MHS
Professor of Medicine and Molecular Genetics and Microbiology
Duke Clinical Research Institute
Duke University
ARLG Principal Investigator
INNOVATIONS Working Group Member

Why do you feel ARLG’s research is important?

ARLG research offers a chance to improve the way antibacterial clinical trials are developed and implemented so that we can find important answers for both the scientific and patient communities. I hope our industry partners take these important learnings to heart as new trials are developed.

Why do you feel that including the voice of the patient is so important to clinical research?
Patient input helps identify specific needs and issues that patients face every day when dealing with infectious diseases. Many times, these needs are not addressed with traditional clinical trial approaches; yet including patient voices can create better market acceptance once agents are approved.

“Deb has fundamentally shifted the way that I conceptualize and consider the perspective of patients and clinical trial participants. Her advocacy for the patient voice continually reinforces the fact that at the core of every study and treatment plan exists a person whose voice and experience should be guiding our efforts to advance science and improve care of those with antibiotic-resistant infections. I am so grateful for her collaboration these past years and will channel her input into my work for years to come.”

Sarah Doernberg, MD, MAS, FIDSA
Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases
University of California, San Francisco
INNOVATIONS Working Group – QoL Task Force Co-Lead

What do you plan to do next?
As a Patient Advocate, I am supporting two new initiatives:

• • • As Co-Director of the new Institute at One Cancer Place, I’m helping to develop a new approach to reach and teach patients about the language and landscapes of cancers and to develop Patient Leaders and Advocates. I hope this work will spill into some ID areas one day!
    • I’ve also served on the Steering Committee and will continue as a member of the Leadership Council for the newly formed Alliance for Rare Cancers as we build a national system for care and research.

I continue to work on these new roles in addition to many other biospecimen/biomarker-driven projects and clinical trials, as well as translational and other types of research.

My colleague, Ella Balasa, is a great Patient Advocate and will be a wonderful addition to the ARLG team!

“Deb has made tremendous contributions to our Innovations Committee which she has been a member of since we started in the Spring of 2020. This group could not have been successful without Deb. Deb has never been afraid to speak up and constantly reminded us to focus our discussions on what’s important to the patient. She regularly asked challenging and insightful questions and was good at always keeping the ‘big picture’ in mind. Deb is always positive and upbeat and a fantastic person to work with on a regular basis. We will miss her on our regular calls!”

Jessica Howard-Anderson, MD, MSc
Assistant Professor, Division of Infectious Diseases
Emory University School of Medicine
INNOVATIONS Working Group – DOOR Task Force Lead

Is there any other information or thoughts you’d like to share with ARLG members?
I really appreciate the respect and comradery that the INNOVATIONS Working Group was able to build. I look forward to following ARLG’s progress and how innovative efforts will be incorporated into all ID clinical trials by academics and companies. Patients are counting on all of us!