Informed Consent in the Newly Established Biobank (original) (raw)
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The Journal of law, medicine & ethics, 2005
iomedical research has always relied on access to human biological materials and clinical infor-B mation, resources that when combined form biobanks. In the past, it appears that investigators sometimes used these resources with relatively little oversight, and without the consent of the individuals from whom these materials and information were obtained. Several developments in the last ten to fifteen years have converged to place greater emphasis on the role of individual consent in the creation and use of biobanks. The most important by far is the power of information technology, which has transformed our lives in almost every domain. In the research setting, it is now easy to abstract information from electronic medical records. Computers make it possible to analyze enormous datasets and have contributed in essential ways to the dramatic increases in our understanding of genomics and other areas of biomedical science. Information technology, however, has a potential Achilles heel. If inadequate attention is paid to security, others can access electronically stored information and perhaps use it to harm individuals and larger groups. As a result, people are increasingly worried about their privacy and want more control over who has access to information about them, and under what conditions. These desires are often manifested in requests for more stringent requirements for informed consent.
Journal of Public Health Research, 2013
Background. The Center for Transfusion Medicine, Cell Therapy and Cryobiology, Milan, Northern Italy, is the headquarter of the POLI-MI biobank. It co-ordinates the biobank activities of the Fondazione Ca' Granda Ospedale Maggiore Policlinico of Milan. Such activities require specific safeguarding of donors' rights and protection of sensitive and genetic data. The Fondazione Ca' Granda Ospedale Maggiore Policlinico has set up a project on informed consent with the aim of developing awareness and understanding of this issue. Within this project, it has been decided to evaluate how consent for biobanking material is expressed.
Special report Biobank research and ethics: the problem of informed consent in Polish biobanks
Archives of Medical Science, 2011
Introduction: The dynamic development of biobanks causes some ethical, social, and legal problems. The most discussed problems are obtaining informed consent, especially for future research, from minors and from deceased people. The aim of this article is to present the current standards held by Polish biobanks concerning obtaining a participant's informed consent in some aspects. Material and methods: Survey was carried out by anonymous questionnaire among 59 institutions which deal with the collecting and storage of human cells and tissues in the year 2008. Twenty four filled-in copies of the questionnaires were sent back (return = 41%). Results: Almost every institution (92%) obtains written consent, but a third of the surveyed institutions (29%) do not obtain consent for the future use of the samples. The majority of the respondents (83%) support the idea of using biological materials for research purposes of a donor who died if he did not leave any written objection to such practices and 46% of respondents stated that biobanks should obtain the consent from the already mature donor who gave their samples as a child. Conclusions: The practice and rules for obtaining informed consent for the scientific research require improvement. The possibility to use the human materials in the future, conditions for getting access to the data, the possibility of their withdrawal from the database and using the materials and data after the death of the donor should be clearly determined when the informed consent to collect the material is obtained.
With the progress in bioinformatics, genomics, and epidemiology, biobanks, as repositories of populations’ biological samples as well as of personal and medical information, are becoming an essential research tool. Despite the potential benefits biobanks may bring and the options presented by some of the current biobanks’ consent policies, there remain ethical concerns regarding the autonomy and dignity of research participants if consent is not fully informed as dictated in the terms of traditional informed consent. This article aims at providing an overview of the approaches taken by the main international norms with respect to informed and broad consent and how well these norms are integrated by biobanks or biobank consortia. We conclude that broad consent could be an important tool to achieve the benefits of large-scale biobanks projects. If it is to be accepted, its regulation and implementation need to be mindful of the participant’s dignity and autonomy and sensitive to the need for international coherence and harmonization.
Biobank research, informed consent and society. Towards a new alliance?
Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 2015
With the rise of -omics disciplines and biobank research, personal data and biosamples crossing national borders pose new ethical questions. In this article, informed consent, as originally conceived, is shown as not being sufficient to address aims of research and interests of patients any more. Therefore the author has, after having scrutinised issues in biobanking, sketched a model of dynamic consent and a manner of scrutinising ethical issues through empirical data.
Scientists’ perspectives on consent in the context of biobanking research
European Journal of Human Genetics, 2014
Most bioethics studies have focused on capturing the views of patients and the general public on research ethics issues related to informed consent for biobanking and only a handful of studies have examined the perceptions of scientists. Capturing the opinions of scientists is important because they are intimately involved with biobanks as collectors and users of samples and health information. In this study, we performed interviews with scientists followed by qualitative analysis to capture the diversity of perspectives on informed consent. We found that the majority of scientists in our study reported their preference for a general consent approach although they do not believe there to be a consensus on consent type. Despite their overall desire for a general consent model, many reported several concerns including donors needing some form of assurance that nothing unethical will be done with their samples and information. Finally, scientists reported mixed opinions about incorporating exclusion clauses in informed consent as a means of limiting some types of contentious research as a mechanism to assure donors that their samples and information are being handled appropriately. This study is one of the first to capture the views of scientists on informed consent in biobanking. Future studies should attempt to generalize findings on the perspectives of different scientists on informed consent for biobanking.
Biobanks have evolved, and their governance procedures have undergone important transformations. Our paper examines this issue by focusing on the perspective of the professionals working in management or scientific roles in research-based biobanks, who have an important impact on shaping these transformations. In particular, it highlights that recent advances in molecular medicine and genomic research have raised a range of ethical, legal and societal implications (ELSI) related to biobank-based research, impacting directly on regulations and local practices of informed consent (IC), private-public partnerships (PPPs), and engagement of participants. In our study, we investigate the ways that these concerns influence biobanking practices and assess the level of satisfaction of the cross-national biobanking research communities with the ELSI related procedures that are currently in place. We conducted an online survey among biobankers and researchers to investigate secondary use of data, informing and/or re-contacting participants, sharing of data with third parties from industry, participant engagement, and collaboration with industrial partners. Findings highlight the need for a more inclusive and transparent biobanking practice where biobanks are seen in a more active role in providing information and communicating with participants; the need to improve the current IC procedures and the role of biobanks in sharing of samples and data with industry partners and different countries, and the need for practical, tangible and hands-on ethical and legal guidance.