Case Study: Baltimore Research and Education Foundation achieves secure, streamlined participant payments with Greenphire's ClinCard

The Value and Our Experience After One Year

The Baltimore Research and Education Foundation, a nonprofit that supports research for the VA Maryland Health Care System, faced mounting problems paying veteran participants using checks and petty cash. Mailings were often returned because many veterans are transient, cash was insecure, and manual payment tracking was time-consuming and error-prone—issues that became urgent during a large survey study and with the shift to remote visits during COVID-19.

The site implemented ClinCard, a reloadable prepaid card and portal that enables remote and repeat payments, cash withdrawals without a bank account, and debit-style purchases. ClinCard provided transparent, IT‑approved accounting reports, reduced administrative burden for coordinators, improved trial accrual monitoring and internal controls, and delivered responsive customer support; as a result, more trials are adopting the system and the site has limited cash use to exceptions.

Baltimore Research and Education Foundation

Cary Zink

Executive Director