Thanks to Dr Ghaiath Hussein for drawing our attention to his book - is there a free version available anywhere?
Regarding the situation on research ethics committees in Africa, here is a link to a paper we published in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine covering the first survey conducted of research ethics policies and practice: https://www.academia.edu/28423942/Research_ethics_policies_and_practices...
Best,
Chris
Chris Zielinski
Centre for Global Health, University of Winchester, UK
Past President and Board Member, World Association of Medical Editors (WAME)
Blogs; http://ziggytheblue.wordpress.com and http://ziggytheblue.tumblr.com
Publications: http://www.researchgate.net and https://winchester.academia.edu/ChrisZielinski/
HIFA profile: Chris Zielinski: Chris is a Visiting Fellow at the University of Winchester and Past President of the World Association of Medical Editors. Chris has held senior positions in publishing and knowledge management at WHO, where he served on WHO’s Ethical Review Committee and originated the African Health Observatory. During his time as Chief Executive of the UK Authors Licensing and Collecting Society, Chris was a director of the UK Copyright Licensing Agency, Educational Recording Agency, and International Association of Audiovisual Writers and Directors. Earlier, he founded ExtraMED to publish developing country medical journals on CD-ROM. Recent activities include papers on AI, and acting as lead author of the WAME guidelines (https://wame.org/page3.php?id=106). A major project has been to encourage hundreds of journals worldwide to publish editorials on nuclear risk and climate change (https://www.ifipnews.org/the-multi-journal-editorial-project/). chris AT chriszielinski.com. His publications are at https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Chris-Zielinski and his blog is http://ziggytheblue.wordrpress.com
On 26/08/2026 06:08 UTC Ghaiath Hussein, Sudan <hifa@hifaforums.org> wrote:
Dear colleagues,
I wanted to share something I have been working on for some time, particularly because many of you have contributed, directly or indirectly, to the thinking behind it.
I have recently completed Research Ethics Committees in Practice: A Framework for Standards, Governance, and Continuous Improvement.
The book grew out of work I began in 2011, when I developed a national framework for the accreditation of research ethics committees in Sudan upon the request of Dr. Iman Mustafa, the director of research at the time. Over the years, through my work with RECs and research teams in Sudan, Saudi Arabia, humanitarian settings, and more recently in Ireland, I kept returning to the same practical questions: what makes an REC genuinely effective? How can its performance be assessed, and how can international principles be translated into functioning systems in very different institutional and resource contexts?
The book is my attempt to bring that experience and thinking together in a structured framework. It includes 95 measurable standards across seven domains, alongside practical tools for self-assessment, audit, SOP development, performance monitoring, and readiness assessment. It also addresses some of the challenges that are particularly relevant to resource-constrained, conflict-affected, and humanitarian settings and explores principled localisation through a worked example involving Islamic ethics and maqa?id al-shari?ah.
I am sharing it with colleagues whose experience I particularly value, not simply to circulate the book, but because I would genuinely welcome your perspectives on the framework and its practical applicability. In particular, I would be very interested in hearing from those who have worked with RECs in different institutional, regulatory, or humanitarian contexts.
The book is being released as a pilot edition. This reflects an intention to make the framework available for serious use and discussion while remaining open to evidence, experience, and further refinement. I have tried to be explicit about its limitations for the same reason. I am attaching its front matter, along with the first section, to give an idea of how it is structured. [*see note below]
The book is available on:
Amazon: https://a.co/d/04HJ6c3E
Google Books: https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=FsIDEgAAQBAJ
and my website: https://drghaiath.com/research-ethics-committees-in-practice
There is no expectation at all that you read it cover to cover. If you have the opportunity to look at parts that are particularly relevant to your work, I would be very interested in any observations, criticisms or suggestions you may have.
Thank you, as always, for the conversations and experiences that have helped shape this work.
Best wishes,
Ghaiath
HIFA profile: Ghaiath Hussein is a registrar of community medicine and bioethicist by training. His expertise varied from providing assistance for researchers on technical and ethical issues, to editing and developing ethical guidelines and training manuals on research ethics. He has been working in the department of research at the Federal Ministry of Health (Sudan), before being assigned as the Senior Project Officer a MARC (Mapping African Ethics Review Capacity) project managed by COHRED and funded by the European and Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership (EDCTP). Currently, he is an assistant professor of bioethics in King Saud University for Health Sciences, King Fahad Medical City Faculty of Medicine. He also provides voluntary ethics teaching and cosultation services for some regional and international organizations, especially on public health ethical issues. ghaiathme AT gmail.com
[*Note from HIFA moderator (NPW): Thank you Ghaiath. HIFA does not carry attachments.]
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