**2.2 National guidelines**

*Bioethics in Medicine and Society*

results [3].

**2. Evolution of ethics**

are mentioned as below:

**2.1 International guidelines**

The field of ethics involves 'a set of principles of right conduct' [1] and bioethics is well-defined as a branch of applied ethics that studies the philosophical, social and legal issues arising in medicine and life sciences. IFCC-task force has suggested that all the area of medicine to fulfill with ethical standards and guidelines and the field of lab medicine is no exemption. According to the IFCC verdict, prognosis as well as medications associated with certain medical conditions is usually determined by outcome, results and analysis of laboratory tests [2]. When we talk about the laboratory system, staff comes at first as they are directly linked in interaction with patients and their care. Apart from laboratory staff, everyone who is involved on the way is equally responsible for maintaining laboratory ethical values. Henceforth, it is highly obligatory to evade any such activity that would downgrade the expertise, neutrality, outcomes, operational truthfulness or patient's confidence in laboratory. Laboratory staff 's behavior and etiquettes also comes in this category, thus, their actions should be in a professional way for example, wearing laboratory coat/apron, proper dressedup, phones should be turned silent/OFF during the time of testing and not discussing any report with clients and others. Hence, various international and national guidelines and declarations have been evolved with time to time and thus critically upgraded the practice of bio-ethics in the field of biomedical research. Compliance with these guidelines confirms the autonomy, dignity and well-being of participants as well as the integrity and credibility of research

Evolution of biologically-centered ethical guidelines in medical or biomedical research has upgraded the understanding of ethics over the years. Various guidelines and declarations evolved over the period, including international and national,

a.**Nuremberg Code, 1947:** This code was the initiation of modern ethical morals. It introduced the discussion on rationale and explanation of research risks or benefits analysis. Initially there was no ethical conduct for the research involving biological subjects, the time before World War II. Nuremberg, during 1947, was the first to establish ethical principles for such researches which delineates the necessity of competent and trained staff, participant's consent, and circum-

b.**Declaration of Geneva, 1948:** It comes into existence soon after Nuremberg code which emphasized guidelines for ethical issues related to clinical medicine. Soon after Nuremberg code, Declaration of Geneva was conscripted and accepted by World Medical Association (WMA) in 1948. It was actually a physician's oath that was proposed as an amendment of Hippocratic Oath which was the assertion of physician's commitment towards his duty for humanity in medicine. Its concept is applicable to clinical medicine unlike Nuremberg

c.**Declaration of Helsinki, 1964, Revised 1983, 1989, 1996, 2000, 2008, 2013**: It is obliged to make individual rights as informed decisions, duties of

stances under which research should be discontinued [4].

**106**

code [5].

a.National ethical guidelines for Health Research and biomedical sciences involving Human Contributors; ICMR, 2017.

In 2017, Indian Council of Medical Research introduced ethical guidelines for research on Human Participants. In India, it is mandatory for all research organizations to strictly follow these guidelines in letter for all types of biomedical research involving human beings, along with complete documentation to protect safety and wellbeing of all participants [9].
