When a triggering event takes place for a trial, the system evaluates whether that trial is eligible for a Twitter announcement. If the trial is eligible, the system submits a tweet with the following components:
- Base text: A new NCI-sponsored <hashtags> study is now accepting patients. <reference_url>
- A shortened reference URL for the trial record on cancer.gov.
- One or more hashtags, such as #coloncancer or #lymphoma, based on the body sites assigned to the trial.
Triggering events include:
Trial Status change for a Complete trial
Participating Site Status change for an Abbreviated (Industrial) trial
Processing Status change for any trial
The addition of an NCT ID to any trial
The system submits a tweet only when all of the following conditions have been met:
- The trial's Processing Status is Abstraction Verified Response or Abstraction Verified no Response.
- The trial meets one of the following conditions:
- For Complete trials, the Trial Status is Active or Enrolling by Invitation.
- For Abbreviated (Industrial) trials, the Participating Site Status is Active or Enrolling by Invitation.
- A tweet has not been sent for the trial.
- The trial is an original submission. (That is, it is not an amendment.)
- The trial has an NCT ID.
- The trial is not flagged with the flag reason “Do not submit tweets.”
- The trial has been submitted to cancer.gov.
The system can switch off all automatic tweets. Currently, this can be done only by the development team in collaboration with the systems team.
