Making a Commitment to Ethics in Global Health Research Partnerships: A Practical Tool to Support Ethical Practice

Abstract

Global health research partnerships have many benefits, including the development of research capacity and improving the production and use of evidence to improve global health equity. These partnerships also include many challenges, with power and resource differences often leading to inequitable and unethical partnership dynamics. Responding to these challenges and to important gaps in partnership scholarship, the Canadian Coalition for Global Health Research (CCGHR) conducted a three-year, multi-regional consultation to capture the research partnership experiences of stakeholders in South Asia, Latin America, and sub-Saharan Africa. The consultation participants described persistent inequities in the conduct of global health research partnerships and called for a mechanism through which to improve accountability for ethical conduct within partnerships. They also called for a commitment by the global health research community to research partnership ethics. The Partnership Assessment Toolkit (PAT) is a practical tool that enables partners to openly discuss the ethics of their partnership and to put in place structures that create ethical accountability. Clear mechanisms such as the PAT are essential to guide ethical conduct to ensure that global health research partnerships are beneficial to all collaborators, that they reflect the values of the global health endeavor more broadly, and that they ultimately lead to improvements in health outcomes and health equity.

Managing health research capacity strengthening consortia: a systematised review of the published literature

“…In 11 cases, consortia reported engaging in a partnership development process also referred to as an ‘engagement phase’,50 ‘inception phase’42 51 or ‘establishment process’ 52. Typically, this process was used to facilitate partner and stakeholder engagement, identify partner needs and expectations, determine consortium goals, assign roles, establish governance structures, consortium guidelines and procedures, and develop a plan of action.…”

Canada's global health role: supporting equity and global citizenship as a middle power

“…36 This collaborative approach to global health research facilitated collective action on shared problems. To advance this same approach among researchers, in 2003 GHRI helped to create the Canadian Coalition for Global Health Research, which has advocated for research grounded in equity-based South-Canada partnerships 34,37,38 and in 2015 released the Principles for Global Health Research, emphasising equity. [39][40][41] The Canadian approach has focused on building capacity among researchers and research users to promote equity, including the creation of tools such as reporting guidelines for assessment of health equity evidence in systematic reviews, 42,43 training on equity-oriented research for LMIC researchers, 44 and mobilisation of evidence to help policy makers make decisions based on equity.…”

Reimagining Researchers in Health Research Comment on "Experience of Health Leadership in Partnering With University-Based Researchers in Canada: A Call to ‘Re-Imagine’ Research"

“…46,47 Academic institutions need to embrace a process of reimagining the value assessed to service-driven and responsive research, including finding pathways to recognize the importance of time spent building trust and generating products that meet the needs of research users (more than tenure and promotion review committees). In alignment with others' practical wisdom for new and established researchers to cultivate their attention to reflexivity, 33 power and privilege, 48 and meaningful, responsive partnerships, 15,49 Bowen and colleagues' discussion opens possibilities for transformative consideration of research in society. Indeed, the reimagination I describe invokes a restructuring of tenure and promotion criteria in ways that embrace and value this relational work.…”