Citation

Gheondea-Eladi A. J. Empir. Res. Hum. Res. Ethics 2017; 12(4): 246-260.

Affiliation

Research Institute for Quality of Life, Romanian Academy, Bucuresti, Romania.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2017, University of California Press)

DOI

10.1177/1556264617717162

PMID

28664767

Abstract

This article is meant to describe and analyze some of the ethical difficulties encountered in a pilot research on treatment decisions of patients with chronic viral hepatitis C infection in Romania. It departs from an overview of the main ethics codes, and it shows that social health research on patients falls in between institutional codes of ethics. Furthermore, the article moves on to analyze so-called "important moments" of empirical research, such as the implementation of the ethical protocol, dealing with informal payments and with information on shady actions, as well as requests of information from interviewed patients and deciding when and if to breach confidentiality. In an attempt to evaluate the ad hoc solutions found in the field, the concluding remarks discuss these issues at the threshold of theory and practice.

Language: en

Keywords

culture; ethics in practice; relational ethics; research ethics; research with human participants