Research Ethics and Informed Consent

Research carries responsibilities to participants that routine care does not. This level grounds you in why ethics exists, the three principles that guide every decision, who counts as vulnerable, and what makes consent genuinely valid, so ethics becomes protection and respect rather than paperwork.

Who this level is for

Principal investigators, study coordinators, project managers, data managers and research officers in hospitals, NGOs and universities across low- and middle-income countries, and anyone who will interact with study participants. No prior ethics training assumed. Foundations screens a question for ethical acceptability; this is where ethics is taught in full.

What you'll learn

• Why ethics matters in health research, and the historical abuses that made oversight necessary
• The three core principles: respect for persons, beneficence and non-maleficence, and justice
• Who is vulnerable in practice (poverty, low literacy, stigma, power imbalances) and how to select participants fairly without exploitation
• The elements of valid informed consent: information, comprehension and voluntariness
• How to run consent where literacy is low and several languages are spoken (plain language, translators, pictorial aids, teach-back, witnesses)

You finish with: An ethics risk map (vulnerable groups, main risks) + your consent principles.