The People Behind the Products: Francine Lane

My role at Citeline is evolving. For many years I served as Senior Director of Product Management focusing primarily on the TrialScope Disclose and TrialSummaries.com products. Now, I’m transitioning into more of a subject matter expert capacity, focusing on thought leadership and external engagement — writing for industry publications, doing research, speaking at conferences, and helping guide the conversation around clinical trial transparency.

My path to Citeline has been through acquisition and divestiture. Citeline is my sixth or seventh company with this product. I have been working with this disclosure solution since its inception, and looking forward to see where the new team takes it next!

I have been leading a project to review and update major compliance rules, which requires extensive regulatory analysis. We’re implementing a new Rules Creator module that will dramatically increase our flexibility and speed in delivering rule updates to our customers. When regulatory requirements change, this will allow us to push updates much faster, directly impacting our customers’ ability to stay compliant.

I’m also conducting primary research on how physicians identify clinical trials for their patients. I want to understand the criteria they use and the challenges they encounter in the search process. The findings have practical implications:  If physicians are struggling with certain search parameters on platforms like ClinicalTrials.gov or sponsor websites, we can advise our customers how to optimize their trial information to improve results.  This could mean more precision in condition terminology, or including medical keywords.

There is a strong industry trend towards plain language communication to make content more patient-friendly, which is important.  But there is evidence suggesting we need to balance accessibility with the clinical precision that physicians require to efficiently identify relevant trials. I’ll be presenting my initial findings at PHUSE US Connect in March 2026.

I have been working in clinical trial disclosure since 2005 — before the US regulation even existed, when the transparency landscape was just beginning to take shape. Over nearly two decades, I’ve built relationships with people across the entire ecosystem: regulatory agencies, pharmaceutical companies, educational institutions, and other vendors. What strikes me most is how collaborative this community is.  Everyone is genuinely trying to solve the same complex problems, and there’s a real willingness to help each other navigate the challenges. 

When I attend conferences and reconnect with colleagues I haven’t seen in a couple of years, it feels like a reunion — the kind where you actually like everyone there.  The people in this space are mission-driven. They are trying to get it right and do right by patients and the public.

That sense of purpose matters, especially when you're deep in the technical details of regulatory compliance. It can be easy to lose sight of the bigger picture when analyzing a registry or validating data fields. But this work ultimately serves transparency, and transparency serves patients and public health. Being part of a community committed to that mission is what I value most.

The challenge is also what makes it interesting — wearing many hats. Because I have been in this space for so long, I’ve become the institutional knowledge resource for a lot of the unusual edge cases and historical context. I can explain why certain product decisions were made years ago, interpret new regulatory guidance, and make sure our tools align with the regulatory and market requirements. I may also be fielding complex “Ask the Analyst” questions from customers across Citeline’s product portfolio.

The variety keeps the work engaging, but the constant context switching can be demanding. There is always more work than hours in the day.  That said, I still find it rewarding. I get frustrated sometimes, as everyone does, but the work remains important to me. Clinical trial transparency matters and I’m still passionate about getting it right.

It was a fantastic experience and, honestly, the DIA Disclosure and Transparency Community is one of the best resources for staying current in this field. We meet monthly, and what makes it unique is the direct access to regulatory stakeholders — the ClinicalTrials.gov team and the European Medicines Agency team participate regularly.  There aren’t many forums where you can have real-time dialogue with the people who operate the registries and shape the policies you’re working with. 

Leading the community gave me the opportunity to connect with professionals across the industry and help facilitate those conversations.  For anyone working in disclosure, it’s genuinely one of the most valuable hours you can spend each month to hear about policy and registry updates, implementation challenges, emerging requirements, and questions from your peers.

After nearly 20 years in New York City, my family moved to the suburbs post-COVID, and I have discovered I love gardening. I suspect my husband enjoys the results of the garden (he loves to cook) more than the extra work helping me with garden and landscape projects. I’m an avid reader, and there’s nothing like having a nice glass of wine and a good book out on the patio.

I also have a teenage daughter in high school, so a lot of my “spare time” involves shuttling her to friends’ houses and activities. It is a busy phase of life, but a good one.

The UK regulation goes into effect in April 2026, so that will be a major focus for people who are conducting trials there. The UK requirements align more closely  with the Good Clinical Practice guidance and the Declaration of Helsinki than some of the other requirements. It’s an ethical framework, not just a compliance checkbox. I think there will be a broader trend to register and provide summary results for all trials conducted in humans, at least by the time that the product reaches approval.

This aligns with what Jennifer Miller and Bioethics International is doing with the Good Pharma Scorecard. Even when regulations haven’t caught up, there’s growing momentum towards transparency as an ethical imperative. The question of “should I register this trial” is being replaced by “yes, of course this trial will be registered.”

AI is obviously going to have a big impact on disclosure and regulatory. Sponsors and vendors are all experimenting with AI for content generation — plain-language summaries, registry authoring, and even protocol development, which indirectly influences disclosure quality. There’s also interest in using AI to interpret regulatory requirements.

But, I’ll be honest, the technology isn’t reliable enough yet to operate without human oversight. AI-assisted writing is improving quickly, but you absolutely need someone reviewing the output to catch errors or nonsensical content. It’s a powerful tool, but it requires expert judgement to use effectively.

I also think we’ll see a continued geographic shift in where trials are conducted over the next five years. There’s already been movement from Europe and the US toward China and other parts of Asia. That trend will have ripple effects on disclosure practices as different regulatory frameworks come into play.