Authors: Prashil Shetty, Dr. Harsha K. Rajasimha
Rising Pressure in Obesity Research: A Crowded, Complex Landscape
Obesity is one of the most pressing global health challenges of our time. According to the World Health Organization, over 1 billion people worldwide are living with obesity—including 650 million adults, 340 million adolescents, and 39 million children (WHO, 2025) . The condition is a major risk factor for type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and several forms of cancer, placing a significant and growing burden on healthcare systems worldwide.
In response to this crisis, the pipeline of clinical trials targeting obesity and related metabolic conditions has surged. The past few years have seen an unprecedented wave of innovation, especially around GLP-1 receptor agonists and dual-acting incretin therapies. As of mid-2025, there are over 11,400 obesity-related studies registered globally, with more than 1,400 actively recruiting (Clinicaltrials.gov, 2025). A wide range of companies drives this growth—both pharmaceutical giants and emerging biotechs—all racing to bring next-generation obesity and weight management therapies to market. This includes a sharp rise in Phase II and III trials, many of which are competing for similar patient populations, timelines, and geographic regions.
Notable organizations in this space include Eli Lilly, Novo Nordisk, Amgen, Altimmune, Viking Therapeutics, Boehringer Ingelheim, Zealand Pharma, and Structure Therapeutics, among many others.
Yet despite this momentum, the path to getting these therapies to market is far from straightforward. Sponsors face increasingly complex trial designs, more stringent diversity and inclusion targets, and heightened regulatory expectations for demonstrating real-world relevance. The stakes are particularly high in obesity trials, where eligibility criteria are often narrow, retention is difficult, and patient motivation can fluctuate over time.
As trial volume accelerates and competition intensifies, the ability to recruit the right patients—quickly, efficiently, and at scale—has become one of the most critical bottlenecks in clinical research today.
Barriers to Enrollment: Why Obesity Trials Fall Behind
Recruitment has always been a complex undertaking in clinical research, but obesity and weight loss trials present a particularly difficult landscape. The patient populations are large, yet finding the right participants remains exceptionally challenging. Despite the surge in interest and investment in this therapeutic area, recruitment timelines continue to lag—slowing progress and increasing costs.
One of the core issues lies in the eligibility criteria. Obesity trials often come with strict inclusion and exclusion parameters that go beyond simple BMI thresholds. Participants may need to meet specific metabolic profiles, have or not have comorbid conditions like type 2 diabetes or hypertension, and be free of medications that could interfere with study drugs. This significantly narrows the eligible pool. Even among those who express initial interest, screen failure rates tend to be high, requiring trial teams to review and reject large volumes of applicants before enrollment targets are met.
Retention is another critical concern. Many obesity and weight loss studies require long-term follow-up and lifestyle compliance, which can be difficult for participants to sustain. Dropout rates remain a persistent challenge, particularly in trials involving behavioral interventions or slow-onset therapeutic effects. When participants disengage midway through a study, data completeness suffers and timelines are extended, sometimes jeopardizing the entire study design. In these clinical trials, one-third to one-half of participants drop out within one year, which compromises data integrity and trial timelines (Delahanty et al., 2016).
There is also growing pressure to improve the demographic diversity of trial populations. While obesity disproportionately affects certain racial and ethnic groups, these communities remain underrepresented in clinical research. Cultural, socioeconomic, and logistical barriers often prevent outreach from converting into actual participation. This lack of representation can affect regulatory acceptance and market relevance of trial results.
Compounding these challenges is the fact that many trial sites still rely on traditional recruitment methods—physician referrals, on-site posters, local outreach—that are slow, siloed, and often disconnected from where today’s patients seek and receive health information. Without more intelligent systems for identifying, qualifying, and engaging participants, even well-funded trials are forced into lengthy and unpredictable recruitment cycles.
All of this is happening in an increasingly competitive environment. Dozens of obesity trials now launch every quarter, many targeting overlapping populations and therapeutic mechanisms. For sponsors and research teams, the ability to recruit quickly and efficiently is no longer a nice-to-have—it’s a strategic imperative.
The New Standard for Patient Matching and Engagement
The traditional playbook for clinical trial recruitment is no longer sufficient—especially in high-demand, high-complexity areas like obesity and weight loss. Manual screening, passive outreach, and disconnected systems often lead to missed opportunities, long delays, and overburdened trial teams. In a space where every week of delay adds pressure on funding and first-to-market timelines, a more intelligent, integrated solution is required.
Jeeva offers a unified platform purpose-built to streamline recruitment from end to end. At the core of this system is a proprietary AI-driven patient matching engine that interprets complex inclusion and exclusion criteria using natural language processing (NLP). It then applies machine learning models trained on real-world data to identify high-probability candidates from a wide range of digital sources. This approach transforms what was once a manual, site-by-site process into an automated, scalable engine for targeted patient identification.
But Jeeva is more than a matching algorithm—it’s a full-stack recruitment and engagement platform. It integrates digital screening, eConsent, remote visits, reminders, and engagement workflows to deliver a seamless experience for both patients and sites. This is especially important in obesity trials, where eligibility requirements are narrow, participant motivation fluctuates over time, and site staff are often stretched thin.
Our clinical trial patient engagement software works in sync with external systems and partner ecosystems to enhance operational interoperability. Through our integration with IQVIA One Home for Sites™, Jeeva enables broader reach and alignment with site workflows—reducing fragmentation, minimizing duplicate data entry, and ensuring smoother deployment across multicenter studies. Sponsors benefit from improved visibility and control across recruitment pipelines, while sites experience reduced administrative burden and increased participant throughput.
Jeeva also incorporates predictive analytics to go beyond simple eligibility. Our clinical trial software platform scores participants based on their likelihood to enroll, remain engaged, and complete the trial—empowering sponsors to prioritize high-retention candidates and improve trial efficiency from day one.
With the ability to optimize for demographic and geographic diversity, Jeeva supports sponsors in meeting their enrollment goals while staying aligned with growing expectations around inclusion and representativeness in clinical research.
In short, Jeeva doesn’t just help you find patients—it helps you find the right patients, faster, while enabling a more efficient, connected, and patient-friendly trial experience.
Real-World Results: Driving Speed and Study Confidence
The shift toward AI-driven and digitally enabled trial operations is already making a measurable difference in obesity and weight loss research. Sponsors using Jeeva’s unified eclinical platform have moved beyond traditional bottlenecks—accelerating patient identification, easing site workload, and improving participant follow-through.
Obesity trials, in particular, benefit from structured, tech-enabled workflows that simplify the complexity of recruitment and retention. By automating pre-screening and centralizing participant engagement, Jeeva enables trial teams to operate with greater speed and clarity. Sites can focus on meaningful interactions instead of administrative backlogs, while sponsors maintain oversight with real-time data on recruitment status and participant activity.
Retention also improves when participants feel supported. Jeeva’s communication tools and digital engagement features keep patients better informed and more connected throughout their journey—reducing dropouts and helping studies stay on track.
The result? Trials that are not only faster to enroll but also more resilient during execution. For sponsors navigating the competitive, high-stakes landscape of obesity therapeutics, this shift isn’t just operational—it’s strategic.
Jeeva helps ensure that execution gaps don’t stall the promise of innovation. With the right platform, timelines become more predictable, patient journeys more manageable, and trial outcomes more within reach.
References
1. Clinicaltrials.gov. (2025). Search for: obesity | Card Results | ClinicalTrials.gov. https://clinicaltrials.gov/search?cond=obesity
2. Delahanty, L. M., Riggs, M., Klioze, S. S., Chew, R. D., England, R. D., & Digenio, A. (2016). Maximizing retention in long‐term clinical trials of a weight loss agent: use of a dietitian support team. Obesity Science & Practice, 2(3), 256. https://doi.org/10.1002/OSP4.57
3. WHO. (2025, May 7). Obesity and overweight. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/obesity-and-overweight
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