The development of the research ethics committees has accelerated especially in the last 30 years. In parallel with these developments, the importance of ethics committees has increased and ethical committee approvals have become mandatory in many studies. In the meta-analysis studies, the approval of the ethics committee may be a matter of debate. Do you think that ethics committee approval is necessary for meta-analysis studies?
My answer is affirmative specifically because it is meta analysis. I believe that there has to be rigorous and critical examination by some review authority and such reviews should be made mandatory in the larger interest of the society
Hi Ilhami,
Often, the main objective of a research ethics committee is to safeguard the interests of the research subjects / participants, more so in primary studies. In a meta-analytic study, the main objective is to summarize evidence from these primary studies. Given the likelihood that the primary studies received ethical approval, it's of no use for a meta-analytic study to seek ethical approval.
Regards
Please ask the question of your International Review Board and Hospital. Ethics Committee.
Dear Dr K N Sheth and Godfrey Habil Mudhune, thanks for your valuable answers.
Dear Dennis Mazur, thanks for your answer. Yes, you are right, it would be more appropriate to ask this question to the International Review Board and Hospital Ethics Committee. I had been thinking like you. I asked this question to two different Hospital Ethics Committee. Since I had received different answers, I transferred the subject to this platform, to get the opinions of the experienced members. I thought it would be appropriate to be discussed in RG platform.
Ethics committees are responsible for ensuring the safety of participants in clinical trials. If you are engaged in the analysis of the results of other studies, that whose safety we need to provide?
Dear Marina Elisovna Guryleva, thanks for your valuable contribution.
Registering protocol of systematic review in PROSPERO ( https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/
) could be an another option instead of IRB approval. Some of the journals need protocol registration in such database before submission of manuscript.
I don't think that it is necessary because most of the data is anonymous!
3 minutes ago
l personally think that there is no need to get ethics approval for meta-analysis studies. The answer of this question may be another question 'what is the reason to get permision for meta-analysis studies?'
Dear Hakan Demirci, why did meta-analysis need ethical committee approval? Because there has a hesitation in a study. I asked the problem to this platform to get opinions of the academics.
You do not need ethics committee approval for a meta-analysis (MA) as you will not be accessing primary patient data and you will not be interacting with patients.
If you performed individual patient data MA, you may reach out to the authors and request the release of de-identified primary data. It is possible that patients may be identified with the reported information if you're analyzing a very rare event as author information is also published in IPD-MAs like all MAs. The primary author should ensure proper de-identification of patient data (e.g. no geographic identifier lower than a zip code), and you should anonymize your data as much as possible.
In short, no.
I do not think it is needed. Unless you are doing meta analysis which involves patients level data from original primsry studies you wish to access.
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