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Psychiatric research has increased remarkably over recent decades to help in understanding the current trends and better therapeutic options for illness. On the other hand, there is also a trend toward higher rates of retraction of published papers in the recent years. Ethics is required to maintain and increase the overall quality and morality of research. Psychiatric research faces several unique ethical challenges. Ethical guidelines are very important tool of research which safeguards participants; however, there is a dearth of such guidelines in India. The present paper aims to review available ethical issues and guidelines pertaining to psychiatric research. A search was conducted on Pubmed using search terms (e.g., "ethics," "psychiatry," "research"). Relevant studies were selected for the review after manual screening of title/abstract. Additional sources were referred to using cross references and Google Scholar. Psychiatric research has several important ethical issues which are different from other medical disciplines. These issues are related to informed consent, confidentiality, conflict of interest, therapeutic misconception, placebo related, vulnerability, exploitation, operational challenges, among others. The current paper has made several recommendations to deal with ethical challenges commonly faced in psychiatric research. The ethical guidelines are utmost needed for Indian psychiatric research. Specific guidelines are lacking pertaining to psychiatric research. The issues and recommendations merit a further discussion and consideration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1964, after a group of psychiatrists questioned Barry Goldwater's mental health during the presidential campaign, the Goldwater rule became part of American Psychiatric Association's medical ethics. The events surrounding the Goldwater rule indicate changes in the practice of psychiatry, but also politics. More recently, thirty-seven psychiatrists were compelled to question the mental health of President Donald Trump believing their greatest responsibility is to the well-being of the citizenry. These psychiatrists point to the intertwining of politics and professional ethics, a relationship, which our paper attempts to better understand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Psychiatrists may become involved in circumstances where a child is seeking termination of pregnancy. Potential roles include capacity advice and advocacy, but ethical and legal uncertainties abound. This paper uses illustrative cases, in an Australian jurisdiction, to exemplify the issues.Conclusion: Termination of pregnancy at the youthful extreme raises unique challenges for all involved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is the introductory paper to the special issue on ethics in psychiatry. We introduce the other papers that follow and set them in a context. Inevitably, they represent only a thin slice of the work going on in psychiatric ethics. But they serve to show two unique features of this discipline. First, it has a tendency to dig deep and to make connections with other philosophical concepts. So, for example, in a number of ways the papers that follow touch on the nature of personhood. We examine this notion. Second, psychiatric ethics, because of its content and its embededness in the real world, tends to hit upon diverse and sometimes conflicting values. We introduce the idea of values-based medicine, which provides both a theoretical framework and a practical approach to the common dilemmas of psychiatric practice. The need to think deeply, but also clearly and coherently, combined with the need to engage with the hurly-burly of the world of patients, users and carers, suggests the reasons why psychiatric ethics offers a paradigm for practical ethics generally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Maternal mental health during the peripartum period is critically important to the wellbeing of mothers and their infants. Numerous studies and clinical trials have focused on various aspects of interventions and treatments for perinatal mental health from the perspective of researchers and medical health professionals. However, less is known about women's experiences of participating in perinatal mental health research, and the ethical issues that arise. Aim: To systematically review the literature on the ethical issues that emerge from pregnant and/or postpartum women's experiences of taking part in perinatal mental health-related research. Methods: Systematic review of nine bibliographic databases, from inception to July 2021. Qualitative, quantitative and mixed method studies were included if they reported on ethical issues experienced by perinatal women. Research ethical issues encompassed any issue relating to women's experiences of being offered study information, recruitment, consent, retention and respect for autonomy. Titles, abstracts and full text screening, appraisal of the methodological quality of included studies, and data extraction, were conducted independently by two reviewers. Ethical considerations: Ethical approval was not required for this systematic review. Findings: A total of 9830 unique citations was retrieved. Six studies met the inclusion criteria. Studies were clinically and methodologically heterogenous, and only one was purposively designed to explore women's experiences. The key finding was the establishment of trust between the researcher and participant in all stages of the research process. Findings are presented according to recruitment and consent processes, participation and retention, and study follow-up and completion. Conclusion: The establishment of trust between the researcher and perinatal women leads to a dynamic with research ethical implications relevant to all stages of perinatal mental health-related research. Further research on the research ethical issues experienced by perinatal women is required because of the limited literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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