The mission of Akron General Health System is to improve the health and lives of the people and communities we serve. Research supports our mission because it can expand basic scientific understanding, grow the practice of medicine, and ultimately improve the delivery of healthcare. Patients benefit from access to preventive and cutting edge therapies and devices. The community benefits because we continually strive to incorporate research into everyday practice and use research to identify the most up-to-date treatments for patients.
The goal of our Conflict of Interest policy is to protect the credibility and integrity of AGHS's staff, ensure public trust and confidence in our Research activities. We do this by promoting objectivity in Research and by establishing standards to ensure that the design, conduct, or reporting of Research will not be biased by any conflicting financial interest of an Investigator.
Conflicts of interest can take many forms. Investigators need to be knowledgeable of all forms to be able to provide not only optimal protection of those people participating in research studies but in support of scientific excellence.
Our existing policy has been revised in 2012 to be in compliance with the new final rule issued by the Department of Health and Human Services. The final rule amends the PHS regulations "Responsibility of Applicants for Promoting Objectivity in Research for which PHS Funding is Sought" (42 C.F.R. Part 50, Subpart F) and "Responsible Prospective Contractors" (45 C.F.R. Part 94). The regulations must be implemented August 24, 2012.
One significant change in this policy is a requirement for institutions to post their Conflict of Interest policy on a publicly available website, as well as public disclosure of identified Financial Conflict of Interest (FCOI) for Public Health Service Funded research. A second change is a requirement for investigators to be trained on the new policy and retraining at least every four years.
The training requirement is fulfilled by completion of the module found on the CITI training website: www.citiprogram.org
Go to: Add a "Course" or "Update Your Learner Groups" for Akron General Medical Center.
Go to the question, "Would you like to take a Conflicts of Interest course?" and answer, "Yes."
"Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on "Continue."
You will be taken back to the main page.
Under "My Courses" scroll down to "Conflict of Interest Stage 1" and click "Enter."
If you are a new user to CITI, instructions for creating an account can be found at: New User Account Information
To review our Research Conflict of Interest Policy and complete our Conflict of Interest Disclosure Form: View Policy
