Pfizer is entering into a collaboration with Private Access, a company specialising in privacy-enhanced search technology, to build a new online community where patients can find out about clinical trials of new drugs and where doctors, companies and researchers can search for test subjects.

"Many patients who could benefit from participation in clinical trials don't enrol in them because they are not aware that potentially relevant research is unde way or they cannot find a specific trial to meet their needs; other woprry that they will lose control of their health information," commented Freda Lewis-Hall, Pfizer's chief medical officer in a press release.

"With unprecedented collaboration among key groups, Pfizer and Private Access believe we can build the preeminent online clinical trial community to be used industry-wide to share knowledge while giving patients the confidence and control to share their health information."

The key to Private Access' technology is that allows patients to control to whom and what purpose they consent access to all, or selected areas, of their personal health information.