Comment by timr

I agree. And people who have been through it frequently (e.g. doctors) have a completely different reaction to those who are going through it for the first time. But still, it's understandably a sensitive subject, and even the person most inured to death reacts differently when it's their own family (or themselves) who is dealing with it.

That said, the folks who are recruiting for clinical trials are often playing on this emotional reaction, and over-promising what can be accomplished, or simply not correcting the misperceptions of the people they are recruiting.

It's hard to recruit people into trials when you tell them with absolute clarity that there's very little chance it will benefit them personally.