Effectiveness of a structured teaching program for the improvement of knowledge regarding ethics on health research among members of selected Institutional Review Committees in Nepal

Members of the Institutional Review Committees (IRCs) were interested in training to effectively carry out their responsibilities to review research proposals for ethical considerations. Thus, an independent educational program was planned to enhance their knowledge of research ethics and familiarize them with ethical research procedures and run the IRC. This study aimed to determine the effectiveness of the educational intervention on knowledge on health research ethics among the members of Institutional Review Committees in Nepal. The study was initiated after obtaining ethical approval. This is a quasi-experimental pretest-posttest study conducted among the members of 11 Institutional Review Committees located in six districts of Nepal from December 2022 to September 2023. The participants went through the structured teaching program consisting of 11 sessions for two days. A validated questionnaire (38 items) was administered before the structured teaching session and post session. The change in the knowledge on research ethics and informed consent process was assessed using McNemar test. Among the 161 participants, nearly a quarter had prior trainings on research ethics including informed consent. The structured teaching program was effective in significantly increasing the knowledge as most of the items had an increase in post-test score compared with the pretest score. The program was successful in increasing in the number of participants who showed improved knowledge regarding ethical aspects of research review process among Institutional Review Committee members ( P < 0.001). The knowledge on research ethics and informed consent was found to be improved post intervention. The structured teaching program significantly increased knowledge about research ethics and informed consent.