Natural history study
In
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
U.S. National Cancer Institute
.