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I was reading an article about some candidate drugs for the COVID-19 infection, and came across a curious usage of read out:

Studies for another drug, remdesivir from Gilead Sciences, are expected to read out in the coming weeks.

Googling for clinical trial "to read out" brings up many instances of the phrase's usage.

Intuitively I understand that "read out" here means "produce results", like a printer produces an output. Is this correct? And what is the source of this usage? Maybe it's some specialized term related to clinical trials?

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  • I have never heard it but from the context it's clear that the results for the drug's study will be made public; as if to be read out loud.
    – Elliot
    Commented Mar 31, 2020 at 3:54
  • merriam-webster.com/dictionary/readout I couldn't find the origin described anywhere, but originally computers didn't have monitors, and instead had data printed out, thus the printed material became a 'readout' because a person had to 'read' the 'output'
    – user379412
    Commented Mar 31, 2020 at 14:14
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    American clinical trial lingo is very distressing at times. Why can't they just use will be made public?
    – Lambie
    Commented Nov 1, 2021 at 17:09

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My friend in the industry wrote up a little explanation for me to share:

The readout is essentially when the results of a clinical trial are made public. It can take a long time (in the case of my last company over a year) to get enough patients for a larger clinical trial to be able to show efficacy at a significant degree. So once you have enough patients that have gone through the treatment cycle (patients will all go through treatment cycles in their own time frames, you don't wait for everyone to go at once) you accumulate the data and comb through extensively and basically try and make the case for your drug if possible. When those final analyzed results are given to stockholders and people not directly involved in final analysis, that's the readout. A readout is a massive thing for small companies that depend on positive results to stay afloat and keep getting invested in.

So yes, it is a specialized term related to clinical trials. I hope that clears up the meaning of the term for you.

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Readouts = results (when clinical trials are concerned). I'm bilingual and looking for its meaning in Polish, I found a bilingual article here: https://ryvu.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Raport-ESPI-18_2020.pdf It matches the context I came across, so I'm pretty sure this answer is correct.

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