Research ethics Flashcards
What is the value of health research?
Health research enables better healthcare - improves the healthcare system
Knowledge is an intrinsic good - even if we don’t know what we will do with it
Why do we need research ethics oversight?
Demonstrates that human beings are capable of hurting another person if told to do so by a person of high authority - can’t rely on the concept of consent, need to be alert to effects of hierarchy and authority
What are key considerations for research ethics?
- Access benefits and harms and ensure ratio is acceptable
- Be aware of potential vulnerabilities of participants
- Avoid or manage conflicts of interest
- Obtains informed consent from participants
- Consider benefits and burdens of research
What is beneficence and non-maleficence?
Beneficence = trying to do something good, trying to benefit people
Non maleficence = duty to do no harm, however a lot things that we try to do that are good may also have harms to people, need to try prevent the harms as much as possible
What are the general polices for balancing benefits and harms?
Consider costs of treatment, resources
What could these people miss out on by being in the study?
Needs to be an awareness of cultural needs
Scientific validity - want good research that leads to good outcomes, don’t want to waste resources nor harm people
What is clinical equipoise?
The requirement that researchers only provide an experimental treatment if the evidence for the experimental treatment is equal to that available for the standard treatment
Who may be vulnerable in society?
Certain groups within a community may be more vulnerable to exploitation due to social or physical disadvantages such as socioeconomic status, racial or religious discrimination, less education, cognitively impaired, older people, people who are disconnected from society e.g. prisoners, children and people who are ill
What is a conflict of interest?
Situation where a person holds two or more potentially incompatible interests. Can arise in research in various ways e.g. professionally, academically, financially and politically
What is informed consent?
Disclosure of the purpose, risks and processes of the study
Reasonable efforts from the researcher to explain this information
That the person is competent to give consent
The absence of any coercive factors
What does justice require?
Transparency
That all people are considered of equal worth
That efforts are made to make society equitable
Within a population there should be a fair distribution of the benefits and burdens of participations in a study - investigators must avoid imposing an unfair burden of participation on particular groups
