Acknowledgements

Katelyn Warr
March 12, 2005
IRB Meeting

On entering the Institutional Review Board Meeting, I had a little bit of background on what was going to take place. I was familiar with the terms: informed consent, autonomy, beneficence, and non-maleficence. After learning about the ins and outs of these terms all quarter, I saw this experience as a once in a lifetime opportunity to see how the concepts are actually applied to the studies first hand. I chose to write my final paper on pesticide testing in humans, because I knew that it would help me to gain valuable information on the rules and regulations surrounding testing procedures in humans, which I would then be able to apply to my understanding of the subjects covered in the IRB meeting.

The first rule of the meeting was confidentiality. I was immediately presented with a confidentiality agreement, which I had to sign, so unfortunately, I cannot go into detail about some of the amazing studies, which are taking place right in our backyard. The meeting consisted of about seven professionals, from areas such as pharmaceuticals, M.D.’s, staff, and even a college student. By having such a wide range of individuals, they are able to get many different perspectives on the ethics involved in conducting these studies.

One image from the meeting that continues to haunt my mind is the piles and piles of paper! Each person had a pile of papers in front of them roughly a foot high, and there were more sporadic piles lying across the long table we were sitting around. They were all very kind, and even gave me my own pile of papers to sort through so that I could keep up with what they were discussing. At least I could try to keep up. Each individual had about two to three of the different studies, which they were in charge of presenting to the group. They would then state what they thought the deficiencies of the study were and give anyone else the chance to state their qualms with the study. After careful consideration of each and every aspect of the study, the group would then take a vote as to whether or not they thought the study passed inspection. Many of the studies were “re-tries”, ones that hadn’t passed inspection before, made the necessary changes, and re-submitted their study for review. Others were new, carefully written studies, hoping to gain permission to conduct their study. One thought that I was not able to get out of my head throughout the meeting was the CHEERS study, which we talked about in class, and I discussed in my final paper. With the amount of care and speculation that is put into each and every one of these studies, it is unbelievable to me that four review boards (as the EPA claims) actually gave the “o.k.” to conduct such an ethically questionable study.

It was very exciting to be able to hear the group talk, and to be able to understand when they spoke about the “autonomy” of a certain study or the deficiencies in the “consent” form. Something new that I learned from the visit is the importance of contingencies. Almost every study that goes through the review process will face some contingencies, before it is actually able to take place. Without reviewing and implementing the contingencies required by the review board, the study will not have permission to take place.

To be in a room with so many talented and successful people was very inspiring. The fact that there was a college student on the board who could handle going to school full time and make the time to critically read these enormous stacks of paper week after week was unbelievable. It made me feel like I could definitely put a lot more effort into my school work. It was also inspiring to see these driven people who are very successful in their prospective fields also somehow make the time to review these studies.

The visit overall was an outstanding experience. I would absolutely recommend anyone who has the opportunity and the interest to visit one of these meetings to do so. It was the perfect way to end this interesting and educational quarter.