<p>Knowledge, awareness, and attitudes about research ethics committees and informed consent among resident doctors</p>

Abstract

Background: Medical research involving humans is now common all over the world. Medical doctors and residents are increasingly involved in such research. As part of their training requirements, medical residents in many institutions have to be involved, to different degrees, in human research projects. Methods: In this study, knowledge, awareness, and attitudes of resident doctors toward research ethics committees (REC) and informed consent (IC) processes were evaluated. For that purpose, a sample of 209 medical residents of different years from a major teaching hospital was surveyed. Results: Results showed that resident doctors had minimal knowledge of major ethical guidelines such as the Declaration of Helsinki and Belmont Report. However, more than half of respondents in this study had general knowledge of REC. Additionally, the majority of participants believed that there is a need for REC in each research conducting institution, and that training is also needed for REC members. Moreover, 82.7% of participants thought that investigators should have some training in research ethics. Finally, the current study showed that 60.3%–88.7% of participants were aware of IC requirements in clinical research. Conclusion: Although many residents showed good knowledge and positive attitudes regarding certain aspects related to REC and IC, others need improvement.

Knowledge and attitude toward ethics committee and ethical research practice among researchers of three sectors: An institutional study in Kuwait

“…These data signify that respondents who handled a greater number of projects exercised and practiced ethical guidelines and attributed high importance to the ethics committee's decision and considered it nal. In our survey, among the trained respondents, 97.7% were aware of the role and functions of the ethics committee, similar results were reported in Jordan and India [21,22]. By contrast, a study from Jordan by Tarboush et al reported that the role of the ethics committee was not well understood by most of their study participants [19].…”

Graduate students reported practices regarding the issue of informed consent and maintaining of data confidentiality in a developing country

“…Moreover, this limited application of proper informed consent processes is in concordance with the fact that graduate students, and even other medical researchers, in developing countries, usually have limited training in research ethics and protection of human subjects during research studies or continuous development/education programs [ 20 , 21 , 22 ]. For example, a study that was conducted in Jordan showed that resident doctors had minimal knowledge of major ethical guidelines such as the Declaration of Helsinki and Belmont Report [ 20 ]. The importance of ethics training in the MENA region to advance scientific research was highlighted in a recent review [ 21 ].…”

The Understanding of Research Ethics at Health Sciences Schools in Jordan: A Cross-Sectional Study

“…Current results revealed a high appreciation of the respondents to the autonomy of research participants ( Table 2, items 4 & 5). However, specific attitudes toward informed consent ( Table 2, items [11][12][13][14] revealed varying attitudes of respondents in comparison with the published literature [1,[12][13][14][15][16][17]. Specific issues on informed consent are growing rapidly in the field of research ethics; e.g.…”