Perioperative medicine & outcomes
Ethical and practical barriers to consent in acute care and anaesthetic clinical trials: A scoping review
Authors' conclusion
Acute-care and anaesthetic trials require adaptive consent frameworks that balance ethical rigour with operational feasibility.
Study context
- Population
- Clinical trials in acute care settings (intensive care units (ICUs), EDs, peri-operative environments)studies included
- Participants
- 15 participants
- Outcome
- Barriers to consent and trial recruitment
Methodological detailsPRISMA-ScR, supplementary ClinicalTrials.gov search
- PRISMA-ScR
- Supplementary ClinicalTrials.gov search
Main finding
As reported in the abstract
- Timing and capacity constraints in high-pressure environments
- Comprehension challenges with technical consent documents, especially in minority populations
- Regulatory variability limiting harmonisation of alternative models (e.g., deferred and staged consent)
- Under-representation of vulnerable groups, leading to selection bias
Further findings
Additional RCTs on ClinicalTrials.gov exploring innovative consent tools (e.g., digital aids, AI chatbots)
- Additional RCTs identified
- 9
- With published results
- 2
Promising strategies
- Multimodal consent, culturally tailored materials, early SDM engagement, and patient and public involvement (PPI)
Original publication
Ethical and practical barriers to consent in acute care and anaesthetic clinical trials: A scoping review. Anaesth Crit Care Pain Med. Published 6 February 2026. doi:10.
Composed by AI from the published abstract and checked against it. How Briefs are made →