Can informed consent to research be adapted to risk? | Journal of Medical Ethics

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Is it ethical for scarce research funding to be diverted to overzealous policing of low risk observational studies?
Joseph Ting
Published on: 9 February 2015

Published on: 9 February 2015
Is it ethical for scarce research funding to be diverted to overzealous policing of low risk observational studies?
- Joseph Ting, Adjunct associate professor,
To the Editor:
A substantial proportion of medical research funding in advanced health economies are diverted to the overzealous policing of low risk observational studies.
As we plea and wait for the resumption of competitive funding to the research endeavour so necessary to maintaining Australia's global stature as a science and innovation based economy, the haemorrhage could be stemmed re- allocati...
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To the Editor:
A substantial proportion of medical research funding in advanced health economies are diverted to the overzealous policing of low risk observational studies.
As we plea and wait for the resumption of competitive funding to the research endeavour so necessary to maintaining Australia's global stature as a science and innovation based economy, the haemorrhage could be stemmed re- allocating scarce resources from the non-productive and demoralising barrier imposed by the layer of administration and bureaucracy that sits on top of, and suffocates, original scientific research.
I faced months of delays to starting low risk studies that aim to record current clinical care practices to establish a baseline from which improvements could be identified and assessed further. This included "behind the scenes" observation of acute pain management and sedation protocols that aim to calm the acutely agitated. Neither study influenced clinician behaviour or treatment as would have been occurred during routine care. Both had already been declared to being above reproach by reputable regulatory and oversight bodies in Melbourne Australia.
I had to expend numerous hours of tortuous negotiation of a maze of needlessly imposed complexity mandated by my local hospital ethics and governance committee. National Ethics Application Forms and numerous other documents had to be identically filled in with my hospital's mast head and be re-submitted to await much-delayed adjudication.
Researchers should contest the resource- and labour-intensive bureaucratisation of research oversight that confers no additional protection to participants in low risk obervational research in the advanced economies, including Australia's.
Australia's gutting of science research funding has at least served to highlight dispiriting barriers posed by administrative processes that are wasteful withut conferring additional benefit or participant protection.
Conflict of Interest:
None declared
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Conflict of Interest:
None declared.
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