Creative Funding from one Adventure Traveler

A while back, I received a query from a reader named Tony, who casually mentioned that he is funding his travels by volunteering as a medical research subject. That caught my attention, and I wrote back to him asking for more information. Here is his reply [editor]:

Hiya Kim!

Well, I just heard about medical trials as an urban myth when I was a student - there's always some stoner telling you of a mystical hosptial that'll give you ten grand for letting them cut your big toe off and sow it back on again!

I figured there must be a grain of truth in it somewhere so I started to have a look around on the net etc. Eventually I bought a book from Biotrax (www.biotrax.co.uk) which listed all the hospitals that do medical trials all over the world!

I rang a few up and that was that. To do trials you have to be fairly healthy, and a none smoker though I know plenty of people who quit smoking just for the length of the trial! They sometimes require people with asthma or other minor conditions, but most trials are carried out on healthy volunteers to evaluate side effects of new medicines.

Sound scary? Terrifying? I was phobic about needles before I started out, and did my first trial for three days to get over it. A few 'sharp scratches' later I pocketed £450. Sweet! I'd been testing a new drug to combat high cholesterol. I'd experienced no side effects, spent a few days playing pool and waching sky tv, and I'd even lowered my cholesterol a few points!

The trials are almost entirely full of backpackers, mostly Ozzies, Kiwis and South Africans, male and female. They pay at least £100 per day, usually a little more. Sometimes they even reimburse travel expenses! You get a (hospital) bed, (hospital) food - not always the greatest, especially when you've got a specifically restricted diet for the study - and free time to chill out.

There are medical procedures going on all the time - maybe a blood test in the morning, blood pressure later on and the occasional ECG. Most of the time though is just time to kill. Typically the hospitals have a large TV lounge with Sky, a computer room with free internet access, a good selection of games, dvd's, the odd playstation knocking around.. some of the better ones have pool tables!

Personaly I always take a sack full of books, all those ones I kept telling myself I'd read but could never get around to in normal life. This time I een borrowed my sister's laptop and wrote nearly 20,000 words of my first travel book!

Personally I've never experienced a single side effect in 5 trials. I've tested drugs for diabetes, various digestive tract things and some anti-depressents. I've known a few people to complain of the odd headache, or very occasionally someone will feel sick for a few days - nothing more. These drugs just need so many hours of human testing before they meet their quota for approval and permission to sell, they just fire through as many volunteers as they can get their hands on, often knowing full well exactly what side effects will or will not manifest themselves. As I said, I've never had any trouble - a positive mental attitude never hurt though!

Sometimes trials come in big blocks of days, 10 or 20 at a time staying in the hospital. Some are outpatients trials, where you visit once or several times a week, sometimes staying overnight for a day or two. Pay is rated accordingly - the best payers are the long blocks of days inside, which are also (for me) the least hassle - forget all that coming and going, trying to keep a job up on the outside at the same time! In January last year I did a 20 day study, and with the £2360 (tax free) I did a Carriean cruise and spent the summer in Ecuador volunteering in an animal refuge. Then went to the states for a brief holiday!

I love the chill-out time. Sure, by the end of a lng trial everyone's getting a bit stir-crazy, we start fantasizing about MacDonalds, the wind, beer...

But then I get out, take the cash, and bugger off somewhere nice for a good few months! I've met al kinds of interesting characters on trials, largely because they're all travelling types. I've got jobs, travel tips, I'm even contemplating going on holiday to the timeshare of one guy I met in here last week. Except that I've already bought my ticket to Koh Samui... and paid for my Divemaster... and left enough over to live on for the 3 months I'm there. All thanks to this medical trial.

Sweet!

The best hospital I've found for trials so far is Parexel in London (most of em are in London, with a few in Manchester, South Wales and Edinburgh. Not to mention France, Switzerland and the USA!) Parexel - www.drugtrial.co.uk Richmond Pharmacology - www.trials4us.co.uk I've got loads of contacts, websites and phone numbers. I can send you 'em if you want - just as soon as I get out of hospital myself!!