Natural history study

In medicine, a natural history study is a study that follows a group of people over time who have, or are at risk of developing, a specific medical condition or disease. A natural history study collects health information over time to understand how the medical condition or disease develops and to give insight into how it might be treated.

A natural history study is often submitted when applying to the FDA or other regulatory agency as a baseline, to show the disease course for untreated patients. The natural history data is compared to the disease course of patients given a proposed therapy to show the effects of the therapy.

References

• Natural history study entry in the public domain NCI Dictionary of Cancer Terms

 This article incorporates public domain material from Dictionary of Cancer Terms. U.S. National Cancer Institute.

This page was last edited on 26 November 2023, at 20:36