Paper
Narrative gaps are a different opacity state from overdue results. They strip the registry page of descriptive text even when other fields remain present.
Which named sponsors accumulate the most CT.gov narrative-gap pages where detailed descriptions and primary outcome descriptions are both missing from older study records? We analysed 249,507 eligible older closed interventional studies from the March 29, 2026 full-registry snapshot. We ranked named sponsors with at least 100 older studies by narrative-gap stock and rate, then compared description-black-box counts, condition extremes, and sponsor-class rates. Boehringer Ingelheim carried the largest narrative-gap stock at 706 studies, followed by Hoffmann-La Roche at 555 and GlaxoSmithKline at 526. Mylan Pharmaceuticals Inc had the sharpest large-sponsor narrative-gap rate at 93.7 percent, healthy-volunteer studies reached 22.0 percent, and industry reached 19.5 percent as a sponsor class. The narrative-gap view shows a different kind of registry opacity because many pages retain dates and status fields yet omit the text needed to understand what was actually studied for readers. Narrative gaps here are registry-page omissions, not proof that protocols or outcome descriptions were never written elsewhere.