| Title |
Ethics of health research with prisoners in Canada
|
|---|---|
| Published in |
BMC Medical Ethics, April 2017
|
| DOI | 10.1186/s12910-017-0189-6 |
| Pubmed ID | |
| Authors |
Diego S. Silva, Flora I. Matheson, James V. Lavery |
| Abstract |
Despite the growing recognition for the need to improve the health of prisoners in Canada and the need for health research, there has been little discussion of the ethical issues with regards to health research with prisoners in Canada. The purpose of this paper is to encourage a national conversation about what it means to conduct ethically sound health research with prisoners given the current realities of the Canadian system. Lessons from the Canadian system could presumably apply in other jurisdictions. Any discussion regarding research ethics with Canadian prisoners must begin by first taking into account the disproportionate number of Indigenous prisoners (e.g., 22-25% of prisoners are Indigenous, while representing approximately 3% of the general Canadian population) and the high proportion of prisoners suffering from mental illnesses (e.g., 45% of males and 69% of female inmates required mental health interventions while in custody). The main ethical challenges that researchers must navigate are (a) the power imbalances between them, the correctional services staff, and the prisoners, and the effects this has on obtaining voluntary consent to research; and (b), the various challenges associated to protecting the privacy and confidentiality of study participants who are prisoners. In order to solve these challenges, a first step would be to develop clear and transparent processes for ethical health research, which ought to be informed by multiple stakeholders, including prisoners, the correctional services staff, and researchers themselves. Stakeholder and community engagement ought to occur in Canada with regards to ethical health research with prisoners that should also include consultation with various parties, including prisoners, correctional services staff, and researchers. It is important that national and provincial research ethics organizations examine the sufficiency of existing research ethics guidance and, where there are gaps, to develop guidelines and help craft policy. |
X Demographics
The data shown below were collected from the profiles of 2 X users who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Geographical breakdown
| Country | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Canada | 1 | 50% |
| Unknown | 1 | 50% |
Demographic breakdown
| Type | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Science communicators (journalists, bloggers, editors) | 1 | 50% |
| Practitioners (doctors, other healthcare professionals) | 1 | 50% |
Mendeley readers
The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 69 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.
Geographical breakdown
| Country | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Unknown | 69 | 100% |
Demographic breakdown
| Readers by professional status | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Researcher | 12 | 17% |
| Student > Master | 11 | 16% |
| Student > Bachelor | 8 | 12% |
| Student > Ph. D. Student | 4 | 6% |
| Other | 3 | 4% |
| Other | 9 | 13% |
| Unknown | 22 | 32% |
| Readers by discipline | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Medicine and Dentistry | 12 | 17% |
| Nursing and Health Professions | 9 | 13% |
| Psychology | 8 | 12% |
| Business, Management and Accounting | 3 | 4% |
| Social Sciences | 3 | 4% |
| Other | 10 | 14% |
| Unknown | 24 | 35% |
Attention Score in Context
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 3. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 27 May 2017.
All research outputs
#13,321,125
of 22,977,819 outputs
Outputs from BMC Medical Ethics
#692
of 994 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#153,173
of 309,818 outputs
Outputs of similar age from BMC Medical Ethics
#19
of 20 outputs
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