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Ethical Issues

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Fundamentals of Clinical Trials

Abstract

People have debated the ethics of clinical trials for as long as trials have been conducted. The arguments have changed over the years and perhaps become more sophisticated, but many of them involve issues such as the physician’s obligations to the individual patient versus societal good, clinical equipoise, study design considerations such as randomization and the choice of control group, including use of placebo, informed consent, conduct of trials in underdeveloped areas, conflict of interest, participant confidentiality and sharing of data and specimens, and publication bias.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Bethesda, MD, USA

    Lawrence M. Friedman

  2. School of Medicine, Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, NC, USA

    Curt D. Furberg

  3. Department of Biostatistics & Medical Informatics, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, USA

    David L. DeMets

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  1. Lawrence M. Friedman
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  2. Curt D. Furberg
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  3. David L. DeMets
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Correspondence to Lawrence M. Friedman .

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Friedman, L.M., Furberg, C.D., DeMets, D.L. (2010). Ethical Issues. In: Fundamentals of Clinical Trials. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-1586-3_2

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