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Category: Research Articles
April 01, 2001
"In Great Britain, as in many other parts of the world, all medical research involving humans is subject to scrutiny by a local research ethics committee (LREC). Local research ethics committees provide independent advice to all bodies belonging to the National Health Service (NHS) within the geo...
April 01, 2001
The aim of this first review of the Research Ethics Committee at the Nelson R Mandela School of Medicine, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, is to provide insight into its structure, composition, procedures and workload, and to assess its strengths and weaknesses.
October 01, 2000
In recent years, there is increasing pressure on academia to develop links with industry and to pursue work of possible commercial value. This pressure results in situations with ethical problems, such as recruitment practices in clinical trials, impact on publication of clinical trial data and a...
October 01, 2000
On September 14, 1990, researchers at the U.S. National Institutes of Health performed the first approved gene therapy procedure on four-year old Ashanti DeSilva, born with severe combined immune deficiency. Doctors removed her white blood cells, let the cells grow in the lab, inserted the missin...
July 01, 2000
Medical ethics is a path illuminated by principles to guide members of the medical profession in their dealings with each other and with their patients. Here, I concern myself with the doctor-doctor relationship, which is under severe stress. I refer to negative professional criticism of one's co...
July 01, 2000
The development of a new drug is a lengthy process. Once a promising compound is identified, it must be investigated in laboratory studies and tested on laboratory animals. After years of work, the newly developed drug is ready for clinical trials, or the testing on human volunteers.
July 01, 2000
Clinical trials of the quinacrine nonsurgical sterilisation (QS) method raise a number of troubling ethical issues. This update on the quinacrine saga will present some of these dilemmas for discussion.
April 01, 2000
This essay will discuss the ethics of medical fees charged by doctors in their individual capacities, for services rendered to patients. There is no rational basis for current practices in fee charging. There are no laws or norms in this regard. Also, what is and is not ethical varies with circum...
April 01, 2000
Scientific research to control women's fertility by causing immune reactions has been continuing for almost three decades all over the world. This search for 'suitable targets within the body' has been extremely controversial, with women's groups and health activists globally opposing the 'vaccin...
January 01, 2000
Women's groups in India have grappled with ethics in medical research since the early '80s when blatant ethical violations during clinical trials came to light. From injectable contraceptives being tested on women unaware that they were part of a trial; inadequate follow-up and downplaying side-e...