MHRDC Holds Basic Ethics Training in Health Research
Last July 1-3, 2015, the MIMAROPA Health Research and Development Consortium (MHRDC) in cooperation with the Regional Office of Department of Health (DOH) MIMAROPA hosted the Basic Ethics Training in Health Research. The40participants of the said training were the member-researcher from the Intuitional Ethics Review Committee (IERC) or who will constituent the IERC of their respective institutions (if not yet existing) with the aim to guide the participating institutions about the Philippine Research Standards and create a plan of how the institution/consortium will be aligned to the standard protocols of the Philippine Health Research Ethics Board (PHREB) in reviewing researches that mainly involves human subjects.
The resource speakers for the training were Dr. Angeles T. Alora, Chair of PHREB subcommittee on information dissemination, training and advocacy (SIDTA) and currently a faculty of University of Santo Tomas (UST) for medicine school and Dr. Rosario O. Santos, also a member of PHREB-SIDTA that is also teaching medicine at University of the Philippines.
Dr. Alora discussed about Introduction to Ethics in Research, Scientific Soundness, Principle of Respect for Person/ Informed Consent, Research Ethics Controls, International Controls, and National Controls needed in ensuring ethical soundness. In addition to the lectures, the Principle of Non-Maleficence, Principle of Beneficence, Principle of Respect for Person/ Informed Consent, Principle of Justice, Institutional Controls: IERC, Revisiting Review and After-Review Procedures, and The Ethical Researcher also pose equally important topics in equipping the researchers were discussed by Dr. Santos.
On the 3rd day, the 10 member-institutions of MHRDC present presented their plan of action regarding the training in order to achieve the objectives of training. Also, the closing ceremony was conducted by giving the researchers their certificates with closing remarks from Mr. Lester Añonuevo, Chairperson of the Research and Development Committee of MHRDC and Planning Officer III of DOH MIMAROPA. The closing ceremony was further synthesized by Dr. Fe V. Ricon, MHRDC Executive Director and Faculty, Palawan State University for meaningful three-day training in order to finally organize the IERC of the respective institutions. Also, all participants were given a book entitled National Ethical Guidelines for Health Research 2011” and a copy of the PCHRD Annual report.
