Research Review Boards Dogged By Criticism

摘要

An undercover investigation into the system that regulates human experimentation in the United States has revealed flaws that expose it to 'unethical manipulation', the Government Accountability Office reported last week.rnThe federal inquiry was launched in January 2008 to probe the network of institutional review boards (IRBs) that oversee research using human patients, such as clinical trials. The boards are often run by universities and hospitals, but, with researchers clamouring for their proposals to be reviewed more quickly, a burgeoning industry ofrnindependent, for-profit IRBs has recently emerged.