Research question and aimClinical Ethics Committees (CECs) aim to support healthcare professionals (HPs) and healthcare organizations to deal with the ethical issues of clinical practice. In 2020,...

Name der Zeitschrift: Jahrbuch für Wissenschaft und Ethik Jahrgang: 20 Heft: 1 Seiten: 237-240.

Fifty years after the death of Edmund Husserl, the main founder of the phenomenological current of thought, we present to the public a four book collection showing in an unprecedented way how Husserl's aspiration to inspire the entire universe of knowledge and scholarship has now been realized. These volumes display for the first time the astounding expansion of phenomenological philosophy throughout the world and the enormous wealth and variety of ideas, insights, and approaches it has inspired. The basic commitment to (...) phenomenological concerns found in all this variety makes this collection a most signifi cant historical document. This second volume of the collection bears witness to a deliberate shift of attention from the earlier to the later phase of Husserl's reflections. We see how his issues - intersubjectivity, ethics, human encounter, the societal world, empathy, the sphere of the self, and the surpassing of dichotomies (bodylpsyche, etc.) - are now at the center of attention in the human sciences. Among the authors are H. Tellenbach, A. Rigobello, C. Balzer, C. Bjurvill, V. Molchanov, E. Syristova, O. Balaban, R. Boehm, M. Sancipriano, O. M. Anwar, Y. Okamoto, B. Holyst, T. Sodeika, and M. De Negri. The studies were gathered at the programs held by The World Institute for Advanced Phenomenological Research and Learning in the commemorative year 1988/1989, chiefly at the First World Congress of Phenomenology at Santiago de Compos tela, Spain, with the aim of assessing the current state of phenomenology. A-T. T. (shrink)

American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and American College of Medical Genetics (ACMG) recently provided two recommendations about predictive genetic testing of children. The Clinical Sequencing Exploratory Research Consortium's Pediatrics Working Group compared these recommendations, focusing on operational and ethical issues specific to decision making for children. Content analysis of the statements addresses two issues: (1) how these recommendations characterize and analyze locus of decision making, as well as the risks and benefits of testing, and (2) whether the guidelines conflict (...) or come to different but compatible conclusions because they consider different testing scenarios. These statements differ in ethically significant ways. AAP/ACMG analyzes risks and benefits using best interests of the child and recommends that, absent ameliorative interventions available during childhood, clinicians should generally decline to order testing. Parents authorize focused tests. ACMG analyzes risks and benefits using the interests of the child and other family members and recommends that sequencing results be examined for additional variants that can lead to ameliorative interventions, regardless of age, which laboratories should report to clinicians who should contextualize the results. Parents must accept additional analysis. The ethical arguments in these statements appear to be in tension with each other. (shrink)

This book is a comprehensive and unique text and reference in medical ethics. By far the most inclusive set of primary documents and articles in the field ever published, it contains over 100 selections. Virtually all pieces appear in their entirety, and a significant number would be difficult to obtain elsewhere. The volume draws upon the literature of history, medicine, philosophical and religious ethics, economics, and sociology. A wide range of topics and issues are covered, such as law (...) and medicine, truth-telling by the physician, research, population policy, genetics, abortion, dying, and individual rights in medical care. The selections span the centuries, beginning with material from the works of Hippocrates, continuing through Thomas Percival, John Stuart Mill, and Claude Bernard, down to modern commentators like Henry K. Beecher, Walsh McDermott, David L. Bazelon, Paul Freund, H. L. A. Hart, John Rawls, Paul Ramsey, Richard McCormick, Rashi Fein, and Bernard Barber. The text has eight major divisions, beginning with sections on the ethical dimensions of the physician-patient relationship in history; the moral bases of medical ethics; and regulation, compulsion, and protection of the consumer in clinical medicine and public health. Each of these sections includes key essays that appear for the first time. All of the book's major divisions contain primary documents: codes such as the Hippocratic Oath, Medieval Law for the Regulation of Medicine, and the first as well as the most recent code of the American Medical Association; court decisions, including those on Karen Quinlan and on abortion in the United States and West Germany; government documents such as the statement of the National Commission on the Protection of Human Subjects, the Tuskegee Syphilis Report, the British Parliamentary debate on euthanasia, and the Council of Europe on rights of the sick and dying; and various published guidelines such as the Harvard Medical School brain death criteria, the American Hospital Association on patient's rights, and Pope Pius XII on the prolongation of life. Cases that illustrate moral dilemmas are provided for discussion purposes. Each section is preceded by a succinct editor's introduction. The documents and essays are of practical value for practitioners and students in medicine, law, ethics, and counselling, and for individual patients and groups concerned with medical care. Through encompassing divergent viewpoints, the essays and primary documents were selected to encourage humane practices and deepen understanding of the multiple traditions that shaped and do shape the development of medicine. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal 14.1 (2004) 47-54 [Access article in PDF] Ethical Guidelines for Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research*(A Recommended Manuscript) Adopted on 16 October 2001Revised on 20 August 2002 Ethics Committee of the Chinese National Human Genome Center at Shanghai, Shanghai 201203 Human embryonic stem cell (ES) research is a great project in the frontier of biomedical science for the twenty-first century. Be- (...) cause the research involves the use of human embryos, it triggers serious debate on ethical issues. Opponents consider the embryo to be an early form of human life that should be respected and not destroyed. However, the majority of scientists support embryonic stem cell research, believing that it offers good prospects for the treatment of diseases that have remained incurable until now and so will benefit humankind. The Ethics Committee of the Department of Ethical, Legal, and Social Implications of the Chinese National Human Genome Center at Shanghai seriously discussed the ethical debate initiated by embryonic stem cell research. We concluded that we should support the scientists of our country in actively carrying out human embryonic stem cell research for the noble cause of "medicine being a beneficent art." For the healthy and orderly development of human embryonic stem cell research in our country, we put forward the following recommended Ethical Guidelines for Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research as a reference for leaders, administrative departments, and related scientists. Preface Article 1. Human embryonic stem cells are the primitive cells that play the main role in the growth and development of a human body. These [End Page 47] primitive cells have the potential for infinite proliferation, self-renewal, and multi-directional differentiation. If scientists can discover the mechanism of differentiation of human embryonic stem cells, it will be possible to induce differentiation of human embryonic stem cells to form various types of human cells for clinical cell therapy. If human embryonic stem cell research can be integrated with modern biomedical engineering techniques, it also will be possible to make repair and replacement of human tissues and organs a reality. Article 2. There are two ways to classify human embryonic stem cells. One way is to classify them according to their potential for differentiation. There could be three kinds of stem cells: totipotent stem cells, pluripotent stem cells, and unipotent stem cells.A totipotent stem cell has the potential to develop into a whole individual. It can differentiate into the more than 200 cell types in the whole body, construct any tissue or organ of the body, and finally develop into a whole individual. The fertilized egg and the cleavage cells at the very early stage of embryonic development are totipotent stem cells.A pluripotent stem cell has the potential to differentiate into many cell types derived from the three embryonic layers. However, it has lost the capacity to develop into a complete organism.A unipotent stem cell is derived from the further differentiation of the pluripotent stem cell. It can differentiate only into one cell type such as a hematopoietic stem cell, neural stem cell, and others.The other way is to classify human stem cells according to their source. There could be two kinds of human stem cells: embryonic stem cells and tissue stem cells (also called adult stem cells). The former involves experimentation with embryos, which has serious ethical implications. Ethical issues associated with the latter are mainly expressed in the various opinions regarding the allocation of health resources. Article 3. Human embryonic stem cells are the group of cells called the blastocyst inner cell mass during the early stage of embryonic development. They are the main source of totipotent stem cells, and hence the focal and hot point in stem cell research. Studies on the clinical application of embryonic stem cells probably will involve use of the somatic cell nucleus transfer (SCNT) technique, which destroys the early human embryo. At present, the ethical and moral debate is very serious in human embryonic stem cell research regarding whether the research will develop... (shrink)

Contemporary research ethics policies started with reflection on the atrocities perpetrated upon concentration camp inmates by Nazi doctors. Apparently, as a consequence of that experience, the policies that now guide human subject research focus on the protection of human subjects by making informed consent the centerpiece of regulatory attention. I take the choice of context for policy design, the initial prioritization of informed consent, and several associated conceptual missteps, to have set research ethics off in (...) the wrong direction. The aim of this paper is to sort out these confusions and their implications and to offer instead a straightforward framework for considering the ethical conduct of human subject research. In the course of this discussion I clarify different senses of autonomy that have been confounded and present more intelligible justifications for informed consent. I also take issue with several of the now accepted dogmas that govern research ethics. These include: the primacy of informed consent, the protection of the vulnerable, the substitution of beneficence for research's social purpose, and the introduction of an untenable distinction between innovation and research. (shrink)

"The Bush administration and Congress are in concert on the goal of developing a fleet of unmanned aircraft that can reduce both defense costs and aircrew losses in combat by taking on at least the most dangerous combat missions. Unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UCAVs) will be neither inexpensive enough to be readily expendable nor-- at least in early development-- capable of performing every combat mission alongside or in lieu of manned sorties. Yet the tremendous potential of such systems is widely (...) recognized, and allies as well as potential adversaries are moving quickly to mount their own research and development programs. The United States is committed to fielding UCAV capabilities by 2010, principally for the missions of suppression of enemy air defense and deep strike, which are among the highest risk tasks for the Air Force and naval aviation."--Overview. (shrink)

The rapidly changing field of genetics affects society through advances in health-care and through implications of genetic research. This study addresses the impacts of new genetic discoveries and technologies on different segments of today's society. The book begins with a chapter on genetic complexity, and subsequent chapters discuss moral and ethical questions arising from today's genetics from the perspectives of health care professionals, the media, the general public, special interest groups and commercial interests.

Bowman-Smart et al. (2023) argue for a framework to examine the ethical issues associated with genetic screening for non-medical traits in the context of noninvasive prenatal testing (NIPT). Such s...

Researchers seeking to engage in projects related to Tribal communities and their citizens, lands, and non-human relatives are responsible for understanding and abiding by each Tribal nation’s research laws and review processes. Few studies, however, have described the many diverse forms of Tribal research review systems across the United States (US). This study provides one of the most comprehensive examinations of research review processes administered by Tribal Research Review Boards (TRRBs) in the US. Through a systematic (...) analysis, we consider TRRBs’ online presence, online documentation, and themes across documents, for five entity types: Tribal nations and Tribal consortiums, Tribal colleges and universities, Tribal health organizations, Indian Health Services, and other Tribal organizations. Results include an assessment of online presence for 98 potential TRRBs, identification of 118 publicly available online documents, and analysis of 41 themes across four document types: Tribal research codes and TRRBs’ guidelines, applications, and post-approval documents. Altogether, this research provides a macro-level analysis of the most common types of TRRBs in the US in an effort to increase researchers’ understanding of these important processes as they prepare to ethically engage Tribal communities in research. These results aim to empower Tribal decision makers as they align their TRRBs’ online visibility and documentation with community priorities and strengthen their protections for the rights and wellbeing of their citizens and community. Ultimately, by expanding our knowledge of TRRBs across the US, this contribution seeks to uphold Tribal sovereignty in research and promote ethical approaches to research with Indigenous communities. (shrink)

This research focuses on how research ethics committee and integrity board members discuss and decide on solutions to case scenarios that involve a dimension of research ethics or integrity in collaborative settings. The cases involved issues around authorship, conflict of interest, disregard of good scientific practice and ethics review, and research with vulnerable populations (children and neonates). The cases were set in a university, a hospital, or a research institute. In the (...) class='Hi'>research, we used a deductive qualitative approach with thematic analysis. Twenty-seven research ethics committee and research integrity board members from 16 European countries and one country outside Europe participated. Participants represented natural and life sciences, social sciences, and humanities. They worked on cases involving ethical/integrity issues in six different constellations. Results show that experts apply key elements of ethical decision making, namely identification of ethical issues, stakeholders, guidelines, solutions, and own positionality, in dealing collaboratively with ethics/ integrity problems, and the nature of the application depends on the complexity of the case. Understanding how individuals knowledgeable in research ethics and integrity, in this case, individuals serving on research ethics committees and integrity boards, approach ethical/ moral issues can help to identify strategies that may be useful in the development of research ethics and integrity training for junior researchers who may benefit from learning professional strategies. (shrink)

As the artificial intelligence (AI) ethics field is currently working towards its operationalisation, ethics review as carried out by research ethics committees (RECs) constitutes a powerful, but so far underdeveloped, framework to make AI ethics effective in practice at the research level. This article contributes to the elaboration of research ethics frameworks for research projects developing and/or using AI. It highlights that these frameworks are still in their infancy and in need (...) of a structure and criteria to ensure AI research projects advance in a way that respects norms and principles. This article proposes to draw from the European Union’s AI Act currently in development to shape these frameworks. Although, in the current form of the draft (as of August 2023), the obligations of the AI Act do not apply to scientific research, it is most likely that they will still have a strong impact on AI research considering the need to anticipate market placement or to test new tools in real world conditions. This article investigates what the risk-based approach in the AI Act implies for research ethics and highlights some AI Act obligations of particular value to implement for ethics review processes. (shrink)

Research Ethics in Applied Economics Emphasizing the new challenges posed by the data science revolution, digital media, and changing standards, Research Ethics in Applied Economics examines the ethical issues faced by the applied economics researcher at each stage of the research process. The first section of the book considers project development, including issues of project management, selection bias in asking research questions, and political incentives in the development and funding of research ideas. The (...) second section addresses data collection and analysis, discussing concerns about participant rights, data falsification, data management, specification search, p-hacking, and replicability. The final section focuses on sharing results with academic audiences and beyond, with an emphasis on self-plagiarism, self-promotion, and the importance of achieving policy impact. The discussion and related recommendations highlight emergent issues in research ethics. Featuring case studies from experienced researchers on how they address ethical issues, this book provides practical guidance to both students and experienced practitioners seeking to navigate ethical issues in their applied economics research. (shrink)

While empirical studies of research ethics and integrity are increasingly common, few have aimed at national scope, and even fewer at current results from Central and Eastern Europe. This article introduces the results of the first national research integrity survey in Estonia, which included all research-performing organisations in Estonia, was inclusive of all disciplines and all levels of experience. A web-based survey was developed and carried out in Estonia with a call sent to all accredited Estonian (...) research institutions. The results indicate that the vast majority (89%) of respondents consider research ethics and integrity issues important and view falsification, fabrication, and plagiarism (FFPs) as the most severe forms of misconduct. Self-reporting of FFPs is generally comparable to levels published in other studies (6.2%). Gift authorship (41%) and hampering the work of a colleague (32%) were problematic practices most noticed among colleagues. At the same time, two of the noticed questionable research practices (QRPs) – salami-slicing and misuse of research funding – were seen as less severe, hinting at the existence of counter-norms that career advancement rules and structural factors like funding policies may encourage. The availability of research ethics and integrity guidelines was considered good. Ethical aspects of studying potentially stigmatising data in a very small research community are discussed in the article and results are analysed through counter-norms and normative dissonance frames. (shrink)

Background The ethical governance of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in health care and public health continues to be an urgent issue for attention in policy, research, and practice. In this paper we report on central themes related to challenges and strategies for promoting ethics in research involving AI in global health, arising from the Global Forum on Bioethics in Research (GFBR), held in Cape Town, South Africa in November 2022. Methods The GFBR is an annual meeting organized (...) by the World Health Organization and supported by the Wellcome Trust, the US National Institutes of Health, the UK Medical Research Council (MRC) and the South African MRC. The forum aims to bring together ethicists, researchers, policymakers, research ethics committee members and other actors to engage with challenges and opportunities specifically related to research ethics. In 2022 the focus of the GFBR was “Ethics of AI in Global Health Research”. The forum consisted of 6 case study presentations, 16 governance presentations, and a series of small group and large group discussions. A total of 87 participants attended the forum from 31 countries around the world, representing disciplines of bioethics, AI, health policy, health professional practice, research funding, and bioinformatics. In this paper, we highlight central insights arising from GFBR 2022. Results We describe the significance of four thematic insights arising from the forum: (1) Appropriateness of building AI, (2) Transferability of AI systems, (3) Accountability for AI decision-making and outcomes, and (4) Individual consent. We then describe eight recommendations for governance leaders to enhance the ethical governance of AI in global health research, addressing issues such as AI impact assessments, environmental values, and fair partnerships. Conclusions The 2022 Global Forum on Bioethics in Research illustrated several innovations in ethical governance of AI for global health research, as well as several areas in need of urgent attention internationally. This summary is intended to inform international and domestic efforts to strengthen research ethics and support the evolution of governance leadership to meet the demands of AI in global health research. (shrink)

This article talks about both clinical research ethics and public health research ethics. Clinical research ethics are defined as set of relevant ethics considered necessary for the conduct of clinical trials in field of the clinical research. While public health research ethics is mainly aimed at finding out what is best for the communities and the populations rather than the individuals. Research ethics is mainly focused on the protection (...) of individual participants and some of the research norms and accepted principles may be challenging when applying in some of the research contexts. (shrink)

The Joint Research Centre (JRC) is the European Commission’s in-house science and knowledge service, employing a substantial staff of scientists devoted to conducting research to provide independent scientific advice for EU policy. Focussed on various research areas aligned with EU priorities, the JRC excels in delivering scientific evidence for policymaking and has published numerous science-for-policy reports and scientific articles. Drawing on a scientific integrity statement, surveys among JRC’s research staff, and thematic discussions with JRC’s research (...) leaders, the JRC has developed a comprehensive Scientific Integrity and Research Ethics (SIRE) framework, including instruments, procedures, and guidelines to ensure high standards and independence in its research. Key components of the SIRE framework include a Scientific Integrity Officer, an Editorial Review Board, a Research Ethics Board, and guidelines for responsible conduct of research. This article provides an overview of the JRC’s SIRE framework and how it was developed, emphasising the importance of maintaining independence, integrity, and ethics in scientific research that supports EU policy. The article also discusses potential gaps in the framework and where additional efforts may be needed, comparing with the recent U.S. National Science and Technology Council report on Protecting the Integrity of Government Science. (shrink)

The application of artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies in healthcare have immense potential to improve the care of patients. While there are some emerging practices surro...

This project is based on the unique ‘Shared ethical debate’ between NHS RECs in the UK in which one research application is reviewed by several research ethics committees. This programme is now in its 6th cycle. In the fifth cycle a prison- based research project was reviewed by each of three NHS RECs that are ‘ flagged’ for such research and their debate and discussions were observed directly by one researcher who recorded the committee processes (...) and the issues raised in committee. Subsequently a focus group of REC members from all three committees was constituted to consider the ethical importance of these issues. The three RECs were consistent in both process and identifying ethical issues. The focus group formulated a basic framework that will further contribute to ensuring a consistent and balanced approach to ethical review within this area of research. (shrink)

Ethical conduct is a maxim in scholarly research as well as scholarly endeavour generally. In the case of research involving humans, few if any question the necessity for ethics approval of procedures by ethics boards or committees. However, concerns have been raised about the appropriateness of ethics approval processes for social science research arguing that the orientation of ethics boards and committees to biomedical and experimental scientific research, institutional risk aversion, and other (...) factors lead to over-protection of research participants and overly restrictive processes that delay and sometimes prevent important social science research. This is particularly significant when social science research is required to respond to social, environmental, or health emergencies and in contract research projects for the reasons explained. This analysis of an ethics approval case study adds to increasing concerns that ethics approval processes can have perverse effects in the social sciences. While a single case study does not provide generalizable findings, in-depth analysis of a significant case can identify issues that need to be further explored. Recommendations offer pathways for facilitating social science research including in emergency situations in which timeliness is important and in collaborative approaches such as participatory action research, while maintaining high ethical standards. (shrink)

Contemporary research ethics policies started with reflection on the atrocities perpetrated upoconcentration camp inmates by Nazi doctors. Apparently, as a consequence of that experience, the policies that now guide human subject research focus on the protection of human subjects by making informed consent the centerpiece of regulatory attention. I take the choice of context for policy design, the initial prioritization of informed consent, and several associated conceptual missteps, to have set research ethics off in the (...) wrong direction. The aim of this paper is to sort out these confusions and their implications and to offer instead a straightforward framework for considering the ethical conduct of human subject research. In the course of this discussion I clarify different senses of autonomy that have been confounded and present more intelligible justifications for informed consent. I also take issue with several of the now accepted dogmas that govern research ethics. These include: the primacy of informed consent, the protection of the vulnerable, the substitution of beneficence for research's social purpose, and the introduction of an untenable distinction between innovation and research. (shrink)

Prior researches have highlighted challenges and variations arising from the requirements of research ethics committees and ethics governance systems across diverse research fields. This emphasizes the need to investigate how universities convey and implement research ethical practices. Research ethics plays a pivotal role in guiding the integration of ethical principles throughout all stages of research starting from its inception and planning to its completion and the dissemination of results. These practices encompass a (...) range of considerations, reviews, guidelines, and processes aimed at safeguarding the rights, dignity, health, safety, and privacy of research participants. Using the content analysis technique, this paper aims to analyse research ethical practices information on universities’ websites from three developed countries and developing countries respectively using the isomorphism conception. The findings suggest that the coercive, normative, and mimetic isomorphic pressures explain the research ethics governance practices. The ethical practices information was disclosed more on university websites of the developed countries. Suggestions to improve the university’s research ethics governance system for the post-COVID-19 era were provided in the paper. (shrink)

Clinical research ethics consultation has emerged in the last 15 years as a service to those involved in the conduct of clinical research who face challenging issues for which more than one course of action may be justified. To respond to a growing field and need for opportunities to share knowledge and experience, the Clinical Research Ethics Consultation Collaborative, established in 2014, holds monthly webinars for its 90 members to present their most challenging cases to (...) each other and engage in substantive discussion. Every year, the group selects the four most interesting cases with accompanying commentaries for publication in the American Journal of Bioethics. This timely book brings together these cases and commentaries under a range of common themes for the first time, creating a permanent collection in book format that encourages and supports readers to gain a better understanding of the ethical challenges that they may face, and providing them with a convenient and reflective resource to reference in their own deliberations. Key Features- Comprehensive collection of cases and commentaries, chosen to reflect the range of issues faced by clinical researchers and oversight committees and illustrate the diversity of analysis that can arise. Supplemented by short introductions to each section. Focus on ethical rather than regulatory issues. Essential Reading for graduate students in bioethics and post-doctoral bioethics fellows, and useful for all participants in training grants that are funded by either NIH or NSF Presenting challenging cases to stimulate reflection, the book provides invaluable guidance to clinicians in training and in practice and to investigators, bioethics consultants, regulators, and oversight bodies. (shrink)

This chapter examines the explicit and implicit roles that the concept of beneficence plays in the guidelines that govern biomedical research involving humans. We suggest that the role beneficence is actually playing in the guidelines is more comprehensive than is commonly assumed. The broader conceptualisation of beneficence proposed here clarifies the relationship of beneficence to respect for autonomy. It does this by showing how respect for autonomy is at the service of beneficence rather than in tension with it.

The ethics review of qualitative health research poses various challenges that are due to a mismatch between the current practice of ethics review and the nature of qualitative methodology. The process of obtaining ethics approval for a study by a research ethics committee before the start of a research study has been described as “procedural ethics” and the identification and handling of ethical issues by researchers during the research process as “ (...) class='Hi'>ethics in practice.” While some authors dispute and other authors defend the use of procedural ethics in relation to qualitative health research, there is general agreement that it needs to be supplemented with ethics in practice. This article aims to provide an illustration of research ethics in practice by reflecting on the ways in which we identified and addressed ethical and methodological issues that arose in the context of an interview study with mental health service users and relatives. We describe the challenges we faced and the solutions we found in relation to the potential vulnerability of research participants, the voluntariness of consent, the increase of participant access and the heterogeneity of the sample, the protection of privacy and internal confidentiality, and the consideration of personal and contextual factors. (shrink)

The role of research ethics committees, and research ethics issues more broadly are often not viewed in the context of the development of scientific methods and the academic community. This topic piece seeks to redress this gap. I begin with a brief outline of the changes we experience within the social sciences before exploring in more detail their impact on research ethics and the practices of research ethics committees. I conclude with recommendations (...) for how the existing research ethics processes may be made more future-proof. (shrink)

The Polish equivalents of Research Ethics Committees are Bioethics Committees (BCs). A questionnaire study has been undertaken to determine their situation. The BC is usually comprised of 13 members. Nine of these are doctors and four are non-doctors. In 2006 BCs assessed an average of 27.3 ± 31.7 (range: 0–131) projects of clinical trials and 71.1 ± 139.8 (range: 0–638) projects of other types of medical research. During one BC meeting an average of 10.3 ± 14.7 (range: (...) 0–71) projects of medical research were assessed (2006). The amendment of Polish laws according with Directive 2001/20/EC caused a percentage increase in BCs which assessed less than 20 projects per year (16% vs. 33% or 42% in 2003 vs. 2005 or 2006 respectively, p < 0,05). The results confirm the usefulness of the current practice of creating BCs by medical universities, medical institutes and regional chambers of physicians and dentists but rationalization of the workload for individual BCs is necessary. (shrink)

Hofmann and Holm’s recent survey on issues of research misconduct with PhD graduates culminated with a notable conclusion by the authors: ‘ Scientific misconduct seems to be an environmental issue as much as a matter of personal integrity’. Here, we re-emphasise the usefulness of an education-based countermeasure against toxic research environments or cultures that promote unethical practices amongst the younger researchers. We posit that an adequately conducted course in research ethics and integrity, with a good dose (...) of case studies and analyses, can function in a manner that is metaphorically akin to vaccination. The training would cultivate the ability to analyse and build confidence in young researchers in making decisions with sound moral reasoning as well as in speaking up or arguing against pressure and coercions into unacceptable behaviour. A sufficiently large number of young researchers exposed to research ethics trainings would essentially provide a research community some degree of lasting herd immunity at its broadest base. Beyond passive immunity, a crop of research ethics-savvy young researchers could also play active and influential roles as role models for others at their level and perhaps even help correct the wayward attitudes of some senior researchers and initiate prompt action from institutional policy makers in a bottom-up manner. (shrink)

Afro-cultural research ethics is in a nascent phase within the field of research ethics as a whole and requires more attention and in-depth articulation. With specific case studies, this vital volume provides unique perspectives on topics such as social autonomy vis-a-vis interests of individuals.

Abstract:This paper explores how Finnish research ethics deals with matters of justice on the levels of practical regulation, political morality, and theoretical studies. The bioethical sets of principles introduced by Tom Beauchamp and James Childress in the United States and Jacob Dahl Rendtorff and Peter Kemp in Europe provide the conceptual background, together with a recently introduced conceptual map of theories of justice and their dimensions. The most striking finding is that the internationally recognized requirement of informed consent (...) for research on humans can be ideologically tricky in a Scandinavian welfare state setting. (shrink)