Ethics of procuring and using organs or tissue from infants and newborns for transplantation, research, or commercial purposes: protocol for a bioethics scoping review

Journal article

Since the inception of transplantation, it has been crucial to ensure that organ or tissue donations are made with valid informed consent to avoid concerns about coercion or exploitation. This issue is particularly challenging when it comes to infants and younger children, insofar as they are unable to provide consent. Despite their vulnerability, infants' organs and tissues are considered valuable for biomedical purposes due to their size and unique properties. This raises questions about the conditions under which it is permissible to remove and use these body parts for transplantation, research, or commercial purposes. The aim of this protocol is to establish a foundation for a scoping review that will identify, clarify, and categorise the main ethical arguments regarding the permissibility of removing and using organs or tissues from infants. The scoping review will follow the methodology outlined by the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI), consisting of five stages: (1) identifying the research question, (2) developing the search strategy, (3) setting inclusion criteria, (4) extracting data, and (5) presenting and analysing the results. We will include both published and unpublished materials that explicitly discuss the ethical arguments related to the procurement and use of infant organs or tissues in the biomedical context. The search will cover various databases, including the National Library of Medicine, Web of Science, EBSCO, and others, as well as grey literature sources. Two raters will independently assess the eligibility of articles, and data from eligible studies will be extracted using a standardised form. The extracted data will then be analysed descriptively through qualitative content analysis.

Authors: Barış, M; Lim, X; Almonte, MT; Shaw, D; Brierley, J

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: F1000Research
• Journal: Wellcome Open Research
• Volume: 9
• Article number: 717
• Publication date: 2024-12-05
• Acceptance date: 2024-11-01
• DOI: 10.12688/wellcomeopenres.23235.1
• EISSN: 2398-502X
• Language: English
• Keywords: infant; organ donation; tissue donation; biomedical ethics; informed consent; transplantation ethics; scoping review