Research Ethics Consultation in Nursing Studies

Despite the importance and acceptance of research ethics consultation as an entity in many medical research areas, little is known about its status in nursing research. Focusing on inquiries from nurse researchers, we retrospectively analyzed records of integrated clinical research consultation, provided by members of the Clinical Research Center independently of the research ethics committee, at a Japanese university hospital during 2018–2019. Among various consultations in nursing studies ( n = 101), 43 were related to research ethics. The main issues in research ethics consultation were compatibility with guidelines ( n = 28; 65%) and application of ethics review ( n = 12; 28%). Future studies should investigate international settings and address the relevance of research ethics consultation to promote proper nursing studies.