Oncology has the most clinical trial money, and the smallest checks per patient

Cancer research dominates the trial economy by any measure you pick. In the disclosed payment data, oncology holds 1,555 US trials and $1.77B in reported research payments, about 30% of every dollar sponsors disclosed. No other therapeutic area comes close on either count.

Then you divide by patients, and per enrollee, oncology posts some of the smallest disclosed figures in the dataset, below the cross-area norm at every single phase.

A third of the market, priced like the middle of it

The median oncology trial costs $285K in disclosed research payments, almost exactly the all-area median of $272K. Oncology is not expensive per trial in this data; it is simply enormous - more trials, more total dollars, more phase 1 activity than anywhere else.

Overall, oncology's $3,863 median per enrollee lands above most areas, but that is composition, not intensity. Cancer's trial mix leans heavily toward small early studies, the kind that carry high per-patient figures in every therapeutic area. Compare phase to phase and the premium disappears.

Below the norm at every phase

At phase 1, oncology shows $7.7K per enrollee against a $10.6K cross-area median, ahead of only respiratory. Cardiometabolic trials post more than double oncology's figure. At phase 2 it is $3.5K against $4.0K. At phase 3, $1.4K against $2.1K.

Why would the most expensive disease area in medicine show the smallest disclosed checks? The likeliest answer is where the money travels, not how much of it exists. Disclosed payments capture what sponsors pay US physicians and teaching hospitals directly. A large share of cancer trial funding moves through academic medical centers, cooperative groups and grant channels that the disclosure rules do not capture. We cover exactly what the disclosure data does and does not see in where the data comes from.

The practical takeaway is about benchmarking discipline: judge an oncology trial against oncology benchmarks. Held to cross-area numbers, a normal cancer study looks underfunded when it is just underdisclosed.

The extreme tail still lives in cancer

Low medians, wild outliers. The highest per-patient figure among the biggest trials in the whole dataset is an oncology study: a phase 2 of ibrutinib plus rituximab in mantle cell lymphoma (NCT01880567) with $11.9M disclosed across 113 patients, $105.6K per enrollee, roughly 30x the oncology phase 2 median.

The dispersion in cost per enrollee in oncology is wide: hundreds of modest basket studies and cooperative-group trials at a few thousand dollars per patient, and a handful of intensive small-cohort studies where the per-patient number reaches six figures. A single oncology benchmark hides that.

Benchmarking a cancer trial with this data

Start from the oncology row of the phase matrix, not the all-area number: $7.7K per enrollee at phase 1, $3.5K at phase 2, $1.4K at phase 3, medians across hundreds of trials each. Treat those as the disclosed floor for US physician and site payments, remember the floor sits further below true cost in oncology than elsewhere, and use the full percentile spread in cost per patient by phase to place a specific study. The all-area picture is in what a clinical trial costs, and the metric definition in cost per enrollee.

Common questions

What does an oncology trial cost per patient? The median disclosed figure is $3,863 per enrollee across all cancer trials: $7.7K at phase 1, $3.5K at phase 2, $1.4K at phase 3. These are floors built from disclosed payments, and full budgets sit well above them.

Why do cancer trials look cheap in this data? Because so much cancer trial funding flows through academic and cooperative-group channels that disclosure rules do not capture. The disclosed floor understates true cost everywhere, and more so in oncology than in most areas.

What does a phase 3 cancer trial cost? The median phase 3 oncology trial shows $1.4K per enrollee in disclosed payments. Published estimates of complete phase 3 budgets reach millions per study and tens of thousands per patient; the distance between those figures is the undisclosed spend.

Data notes

Figures come from CMS Open Payments research payment records matched to ClinicalTrials.gov by NCT number 2020–2024 (January 2026 file release). Oncology coverage: 1,555 US trials with $1.77B in disclosed payments, classified by condition and title keywords. Phase benchmarks exclude no-phase records. All figures are medians unless stated. Every figure is a floor on true cost, and the oncology floor understates full budgets more than most areas because of academic and cooperative-group funding routes.

This article is a market-data benchmarking resource derived from publicly available CMS Open Payments and ClinicalTrials.gov data. Reported figures are disclosed industry research payments and represent a floor on trial cost, not a complete budget, a price quote, or financial advice. Trial budgeting decisions for any specific study remain the judgment of qualified professionals. Healthcare DealHub is not affiliated with CMS or the US government.