Status of informed consent in the original articles published in a medical journal of Bangladesh.
Informed consent and other ethical issues are included in every guideline of research ethics. Taking informed consent from the participants is essential in human health research. The health researchers are not addressing adequately the issues of informed consent and other relevant issues. In many of the published articles in our country, there is no mention of informed consent and other relevant ethical issues. In this study, a 5-years retrospective review was performed on the original articles that described research involving human subjects, and published in the "Journal of Bangladesh College of Physicians and Surgeons" in the period of 1999 to 2003. The objectives of this review were: i) to document whether the author has mentioned about informed consent in the published original article; and ii) to document whether the author has addressed the informed consent procedure in appropriate details. Fifty three original articles were reviewed, only in 7(13.2%) articles the author has mentioned that informed consent was taken from the participants. In 19 (63%) articles, where the subjects were minors or incompetent, there was no mention from whom informed consent was taken. Only in 2(3.7%) articles, the authors have mentioned about the approval of Ethical Review Committee, and in 4(7.5%) articles about the funding agency. Other ethical issues were also ignored. The study documents deficiencies in informed consent and relevant ethical issues in the published articles. This finding demands greater attention to ethical standards on the part of investigators and the editors.
Mollah
As
A
Department of Endocrinology, Chittagong Medical College, Chittagong, Bangladesh. mollahas@yahoo.com
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001459:Bangladesh; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D032984:Ethics, Research; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007258:Informed Consent / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008297:Male; D010506:Periodicals as Topic / Q000941:ethics*; D012189:Retrospective Studies