Should Society Allow Research Ethics Boards to Be Run As For-Profit Enterprises?
Author Information
Author(s): Ezekiel J. Emanuel, Trudo Lemmens, Carl Elliot
Hypothesis
Can for-profit institutional review boards (IRBs) provide high-quality ethics reviews comparable to not-for-profit IRBs?
Conclusion
The debate highlights concerns about conflicts of interest in both for-profit and not-for-profit IRBs, suggesting that quality of review should be the focus rather than the profit status.
Supporting Evidence
- Both for-profit and not-for-profit IRBs can have conflicts of interest.
- Regulatory agencies have not suspended any for-profit IRBs.
- Some for-profit IRBs have established training programs for international IRB administrators.
Takeaway
Some people think that for-profit ethics boards are bad, but the truth is that both for-profit and not-for-profit boards can have problems. We should look at how well they do their job instead of just whether they make money.
Potential Biases
Both for-profit and not-for-profit IRBs have potential conflicts of interest due to financial ties to the research they review.
Limitations
No validated quality indicators for IRB function exist, making it difficult to compare the performance of for-profit and not-for-profit IRBs.
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
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