PAREXEL International Corporation (Nasdaq: PRXL), a leading global biopharmaceutical services provider, today announced that it has expanded its capabilities through the opening of a new early phase unit in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. The Port Elizabeth unit has added more than 40 beds to PAREXEL's global early phase capacity of over 580 beds, which is among the largest capacities worldwide. In addition to providing the capability to conduct a variety of studies in healthy volunteers, the core focus of the Port Elizabeth unit is on early phase studies in patients, from First in Man to Proof of Concept studies.
PAREXEL's other early phase units in South Africa, based in Bloemfontein and George, have a proven track record of conducting challenging early phase patient studies by combining Phase I expertise with successful patient recruitment capabilities. PAREXEL's early phase units are located across three continents, including in Baltimore and Los Angeles in the United States; London, United Kingdom; and Berlin, Germany. PAREXEL's early phase units provide rapid study-start up and direct access to diverse patient populations as well as healthy volunteers. The early phase unit in Port Elizabeth serves as one of the units in the PAREXEL SuperSites(SM) network. The PAREXEL SuperSites network provides high enrollment potential for clinical studies, drawing on dedicated patient recruitment specialists and relationships with local health care professionals. PAREXEL's call center and database capabilities allow for a high number of patients to be recruited in a rapid timeframe.
"Increasing the number of patients per site and reducing the overall number of sites in a study serves to decrease variability—improving study quality and reproducibility," said Michelle Middle, MB ChB, Corporate Vice President and Worldwide Head of Early Phase, PAREXEL International. "The opening of our early phase unit in Port Elizabeth represents PAREXEL's further commitment to offering rapid recruitment solutions to our clients. Port Elizabeth joins our other early phase units, which are integrated and harmonized to handle complex global studies involving healthy volunteers and patient populations."