Ethical review facilitates the appropriate use of data for public benefit. It helps applicants safeguard the rights, dignity, and well-being of their participants/data subjects. The type and extent of such a review will be dependent on the nature of the application. Ethical issues are not restricted to applications for identifying data, neither are they restricted to research applications. The applicant must assess their project for potential ethical issues.
In line with data sharing standard 5a (Objective for Processing) any moral or ethical issues raised by the proposed project must be briefly explained in the application, including actions taken to mitigate them.
An ethical review should complement the applicant’s own consideration of the ethical issues raised by their project and their involvement of patients/service users, care professionals and the public. Even if a project is not classed as research, there are still likely to be ethical considerations. It is helpful to ask questions such as ‘would any of the data subjects have concerns about this work?’, ‘Could this work, or its outcomes, disadvantage a particular section of society?’ The obvious way to explore such questions is to engage with members of the population being studied.
Also, it is well worth considering using tools such as a Data Protection Impact Assessment or an Equality Impact Assessment. Such tools are often used to help meet legal requirements but can also be useful in detecting and resolving ethical issues.