GDM - Contract Researchers

Contract Researchers

Many university, government, and private researchers conduct experiments for companies that use ARM to standardize their efficacy trials. This page contains information to provide more usable experiment data for those research sponsors.

See ARM Frequently Asked Questions: Contract Researchers for additional information.

ARM Company Customizations

Some of GDM's global corporate clients use customized ARM study definitions and validation lists. They also provide their customized study definitions to independent contract researchers. This approach ensures uniformity and enhanced data management.

ARM fully supports these sponsor customizations, and automatically keep protocols and trials in the file version required by the sponsor. A contractor can always use the newest ARM version for all sponsor trials, even if the sponsor is using an older ARM version. The customization itself identifies the required study version, and saves studies in the same format as the sponsor's ARM version.

Since independent contract researchers often conduct research studies for more than one company, GDM has a customized install for company customizations. (See below for installation instructions.)

Each company’s customizations are stored separately, so multiple companies’ customizations can reside on one ARM program. ARM automatically keeps separate settings for each customization, and refers to each as a “Settings profile.”

A contractor or cooperator may request sponsor customizations (pdf) within ARM. After approval, use the method described below in "Installation Directions" to install approved sponsor customizations.

Note: Always sent trials to sponsor using File - Sent to - External Sponsor/Cooperator, to ensure the sponsor receives all trial information.

Installation Directions

A contractor or cooperator may request sponsor customizations (pdf) from the ARM Help menu. Most of the contractor ARM customizations are now delivered and updated by ARM Check for Updates. The rest are sent directly from the company, and are not available through Check for Updates.

Installation steps for the GDM-delivered customizations are:

In ARM select "Help" on the ARM menu bar, then choose "Check for Updates".
On a new PC start by running the ARM Check for Updates program from this link (exe).
It may be necessary to log into Check for Updates with your ARM user name and password to identify your licensed software to obtain. See Installing ARM more information.
When Check for Updates runs, it lists all programs licensed from GDM, and all ARM customizations that are authorized by sponsors.
Select the "Install Updates" button to begin installing all available updates. Note that this method works even on a new PC to install ARM and your ARM license in addition to corporate ARM customizations.

Note: If you have an ARM or customization CD, do not attempt to install from the CD. Most ARM and customization install CDs are very outdated, and may not install properly on a newer PC or ARM version!

The customizations for each company are stored in separate ARM study definition directories, so multiple companies customizations can be used with one ARM program installation.

Opening Studies without Customized Company Files

A few research sponsors do not distribute their ARM customizations outside of their company. However, a contract researcher may occasionally receive a study created with customized study definitions that ARM cannot open because the study definitions are not available in standard ARM installations.

The message "Study definition 'xxxxxx.def' is not present in a known study definition directory. Can ARM search the drives on your computer to locate this study definition?" displays.

If not found, another message displays: "Study definition 'xxxxxx.def' not in current definition directory. Select the directory containing the definition next." Click the OK button.

If the company representative who sent the ARM study is not providing you with their customized study definitions, then on the "Select Study Definition" wizard choose: "Myself or another sponsor (standard GDMdef)":

Click the Next button.

Choose G-All7 for most studies, or G-Seed7 for a pure variety testing study:

Click the Finish button.

Please ensure you are using the most recent ARM maintenance update, since many times the most recent update includes changes to improve compatibility when opening studies into a GDM study definition.