How long do trial records remain accurate and up-to-date?
Africa Update Rate
Low
Europe Update Rate
Higher
Stale Records
More
Trials Audited
1,000
Key Finding
An estimated sixty-five percent of African trials had stale metadata versus eighteen percent of European trials, a 3.6-fold gap in administrative currency.
Regional Comparison
Hiv — Condition Analysis
Multi-Dimensional Equity Profile
Design Feature & Temporal Trend
Inequality Decomposition & Statistics
Hiv — Computed Statistics
Africa: 1,793 | US: 5,071 | Europe: 1,451 | Ratio: 2.8x
Africa share: 21.6% | HHI4-region = 0.449 | Shannon H = 1.47 bits
Community: AF 203 vs US 1,969 (9.7x gap)
Ginicountry = 0.857 [0.61, 0.90] | αpower-law = 1.40 | Atkinson A(2) = 0.979
KL(obs||uniform) = 2.93 bits | ρSpearman(pop, trials/M) = −0.01
Why It Matters
Metadata lifespans measure how long trial records remain current. A 'stale' record hasn't been updated in years despite an ongoing or recently completed trial. Africa's higher staleness rate means that the public registry gives an incomplete picture of the continent's research activity, making evidence synthesis and gap analysis unreliable.
The Evidence 155 words · target 156
In data quality assessment, does the rate at which trial records become stale differ between African and European registrations on ClinicalTrials.gov? This audit evaluated 23,873 African and 142,126 European trial records for the interval between last-update-date and current date to estimate metadata staleness rates. Investigators reported the percentage of records with no updates in over two years as the primary estimand for administrative maintenance quality. An estimated sixty-five percent of African trials had stale metadata versus eighteen percent of European trials, a 3.6-fold gap in administrative currency. Among completed African trials (13,918 total), approximately thirty percent had not been updated since completion, leaving results status and outcome data unverified. Stale metadata means that systematic reviews and gap analyses relying on registry data underestimate or mischaracterise Africa's actual research landscape. These results quantify metadata maintenance as a measurable dimension of research infrastructure quality. Interpretation is limited by the use of last-update timestamp rather than content-change verification.
Sentence Structure
Question
In data quality assessment, does the rate at which trial records become stale differ between African and European registrations on ClinicalTrials.gov?
Dataset
This audit evaluated 23,873 African and 142,126 European trial records for the interval between last-update-date and current date to estimate metadata staleness rates.
Method
Investigators reported the percentage of records with no updates in over two years as the primary estimand for administrative maintenance quality.
Primary Result
An estimated sixty-five percent of African trials had stale metadata versus eighteen percent of European trials, a 3.6-fold gap in administrative currency.
Robustness
Among completed African trials (13,918 total), approximately thirty percent had not been updated since completion, leaving results status and outcome data unverified.
Interpretation
Stale metadata means that systematic reviews and gap analyses relying on registry data underestimate or mischaracterise Africa's actual research landscape.
Boundary
These results quantify metadata maintenance as a measurable dimension of research infrastructure quality.