Biobanking for Genomic and Personalized Health Research: Participant Perceptions and Preferences

What do Australians affected by cancer think about oncology researchers sharing research data? A cross-sectional survey

AIM

Previous research has shown patients and the public in Australia generally support medical researchers in making de-identified research data available to other scientists. However, this research has focussed on certain types of data and recipients. We surveyed Australians affected by cancer to characterize their attitudes toward the sharing of research data with multiple third parties, including the public.

METHODS

A short, anonymous online survey of Australians with a previous diagnosis of cancer was advertised between October 27, 2022, and February 27, 2023. Quantitative responses were analyzed with descriptive statistics. Free-text responses were coded deductively and summarised using content analysis.

RESULTS

In total, 551 respondents contributed data to the survey. There was strong support for cancer researchers sharing non-human and de-identified human research data with clinicians (90% and 95%, respectively) and non-profit researchers (both 94%). However, fewer participants supported sharing data with for-profit researchers (both 64%) or publicly (both 61%). When asked if they would hypothetically consent to researchers at their treatment location using and sharing their de-identified data publicly, only half agreed. In contrast, after being shown a visual representation of the de-identified survey data, 80% of respondents supported sharing it publicly.

CONCLUSION

Australians affected by cancer support the sharing of research data, particularly with clinicians and non-profit researchers. Our results also imply that visualization of the data to be shared may enhance support for making it publicly available. These results should help alleviate any concerns about research participants' attitudes toward data sharing, as well as boost researchers' motivation for sharing.

A systematic literature review of the 'commercialisation effect' on public attitudes towards biobank and genomic data repositories

Initiatives that collect and share genomic data to advance health research are widespread and accelerating. Commercial interests in these efforts, while vital, may erode public trust and willingness to provide personal genomic data, upon which these initiatives depend. Understanding public attitudes towards providing genomic data for health research in the context of commercial involvement is critical. A PRISMA-guided search of six online academic databases identified 113 quantitative and qualitative studies using primary data pertaining to public attitudes towards commercial actors in the management, collection, access, and use of biobank and genomic data. The presence of commercial interests yields interrelated public concerns around consent, privacy and data security, trust in science and scientists, benefit sharing, and the ownership and control of health data. Carefully considered regulatory and data governance and access policies are therefore required to maintain public trust and support for genomic health initiatives.

A Pilot Evaluation of an Educational Video to Support Consent to a Pediatric Malignancy Biobank

Introduction: The collection of biological specimens is necessary to support basic and translational research. However, the complexity of biobanking introduces numerous ethical issues, particularly regarding informed consent. Objective: To evaluate the acceptability and perceived benefits of an educational video facilitating the consent process for the Children's Cancer Centre Biobank. Methods: We invited individuals who had previously consented to be (or their child to be) part of the Biobank, and health professionals who were involved in obtaining consent. Participants watched the video and completed a purpose-designed online survey. Results: A total of 16 health professionals (invited = 30) and 15 patients/caregivers (invited = 127) participated. Most patients/caregivers felt informed about the Biobank at consent, however, noted how overwhelmed they were at the time and that they did not engage with the written information. Overall, both patients/caregivers and health professionals rated the video favorably regarding the information provided and format. Participants valued that it was simple and clear, with several health professionals noting the need for linguistic translations to better support the families they work with. Most patients/caregivers agreed that the video provided enough information to begin considering participation. This aligned with the health professionals' feedback that the video was most effective when used as a conversation starter to help formalize the written consent. Conclusion: Our findings suggest that our video is an acceptable and beneficial tool to assist in the Biobank consenting process, from both the perspective of decision-makers and health professionals obtaining consent. It appears particularly valuable as a precursor to an interactive, formal consent discussion. Further work is required to determine whether our video has a significant impact on outcomes such as decision-making satisfaction and knowledge, and to determine the value to adolescents.

Health data sharing attitudes towards primary and secondary use of data: a systematic review

Background

To receive the best care, people share their health data (HD) with their health practitioners (known as sharing HD for primary purposes). However, during the past two decades, sharing for other (i.e., secondary) purposes has become of great importance in numerous fields, including public health, personalized medicine, research, and development. We aimed to conduct the first comprehensive overview of all studies that investigated people's HD sharing attitudes-along with associated barriers/motivators and significant influencing factors-for all data types and across both primary and secondary uses.

Methods

We searched PubMed, MEDLINE, PsycINFO, Web of Science, EMBASE, and CINAHL for relevant studies published in English between database inception and February 28, 2023, using a predefined set of keywords. Studies were included, regardless of their design, if they reported outcomes related to attitudes towards sharing HD. We extracted key data from the included studies, including the type of HD involved and findings related to: HD sharing attitudes (either in general or depending on type of data/user); barriers/motivators/benefits/concerns of the study participants; and sociodemographic and other variables that could impact HD sharing behaviour. The qualitative synthesis was conducted by dividing the studies according to the data type (resulting in five subgroups) as well as the purpose the data sharing was focused on (primary, secondary or both). The Newcastle-Ottawa Scale (NOS) was used to assess the quality of non-randomised studies. This work was registered with PROSPERO, CRD42023413822.

Findings

Of 2109 studies identified through our search, 116 were included in the qualitative synthesis, yielding a total of 228,501 participants and various types of HD represented: person-generated HD (n = 17 studies and 10,771 participants), personal HD in general (n = 69 studies and 117,054 participants), Biobank data (n = 7 studies and 27,073 participants), genomic data (n = 13 studies and 54,716 participants), and miscellaneous data (n = 10 studies and 18,887 participants). The majority of studies had a moderate level of quality (83 [71.6%] of 116 studies), but varying levels of quality were observed across the included studies. Overall, studies suggest that sharing intentions for primary purposes were observed to be high regardless of data type, and it was higher than sharing intentions for secondary purposes. Sharing for secondary purposes yielded variable findings, where both the highest and the lowest intention rates were observed in the case of studies that explored sharing biobank data (98% and 10%, respectively). Several influencing factors on sharing intentions were identified, such as the type of data recipient, data, consent. Further, concerns related to data sharing that were found to be mutual for all data types included privacy, security, and data access/control, while the perceived benefits included those related to improvements in healthcare. Findings regarding attitudes towards sharing varied significantly across sociodemographic factors and depended on data type and type of use. In most cases, these findings were derived from single studies and therefore warrant confirmations from additional studies.

Interpretation

Sharing health data is a complex issue that is influenced by various factors (the type of health data, the intended use, the data recipient, among others) and these insights could be used to overcome barriers, address people's concerns, and focus on spreading awareness about the data sharing process and benefits.

Funding

None.

When Biobanks Meet Religion: Association Between Religiosity and Attitudes of Polish Medical Students Toward Biobanking of Human Biological Material for Research Purposes

While biobanking is expanding globally, the empirical evidence concerning the impact of religion on future healthcare professionals' awareness and willingness to donate biospecimens for biobank research is lacking. To understand how medical students' religious beliefs can fuel their questions regarding how biospecimens would be stored, cared for, and used, we conducted a survey among 1500 medical students at Poznań University of Medical Sciences. Our findings suggest that, while both religious and nonreligious students supported the idea of biobanking of human biological material and were willing to donate for research purposes, nonreligious students felt more positive toward biobanking, supported the idea of establishing biobanks in Poland more often, and were more eager to donate most types of tissues and to participate in biobank research. Religious beliefs were also associated with medical students' perception of benefits and risks resulting from biobanking, perceived trust toward various biobank institutions, and preferred type of consent.

Public and Patients' Perspectives Towards Data and Sample Sharing for Research: An Overview of Empirical Findings

We aimed to review the attitudes and perspectives of the public and patients towards the sharing of data and biospecimens for research and to identify common dimensions, regardless of setting. Our review included systematic, scoping or thematic reviews of empirical studies retrieved from Medline (PubMed interface), Web of Science, Scopus, ProQuest and Cochrane Reviews. The main themes identified and synthesised across the 14 reviews were readiness and motivations; potential risks and safeguards; trust, transparency and accountability; autonomy and preferred type of consent; and factors influencing data and biospecimen sharing and consent. Sociodemographic factors and research and individual context remain relevant influencing factors in all settings, while preferences for types of consent are highly heterogeneous. Trusted environments and adapted consent options with participant engagement are relevant to improve research participation.

Cluster Donation: How Future Healthcare Professionals Bound Certain Types of Tissues and Biomedical Research and How It Affects Their Willingness to Donate

Although biomedical research requires cooperation with a large number of donors, its success also depends on the input of healthcare professionals who play a crucial role in promoting biomedical research and influencing an individual's decision to donate one's biospecimens that are left over after a medical procedure. This work was aimed at investigating the correlation between medical and healthcare students' willingness to donate a biospecimen, the type of tissues to be donated, and the type of biomedical research to be conducted. A population survey among medical and healthcare students enrolled at the Poznan University of Medical Sciences was conducted on their attitudes toward the donation of human biological material for research purposes. A total of 1500 students responded and completed the survey. The questionnaire used multiple-choice closed-ended questions designed to explore medical and healthcare students' preferences for sharing particular types of tissues and donating to a particular type of biomedical research. It asked three questions: 1. Which type of tissue would people be willing to donate for research purposes? 2. Which organs would they be willing to donate after death? 3. What type of research would they be willing to donate to? While future healthcare professionals' beliefs regarding certain types of tissues and research can influence their willingness to donate for research purposes, many students tend to think about the body and biomedical research in terms of clusters. Consequently, their willingness to donate certain tissues for a particular type of research can affect their decision to donate other tissues. Our data suggest that cluster thinking with regard to donation can be a predictor of people's readiness to participate in the collection and management of biospecimens.

REDCap and the National Mesothelioma Virtual Bank-a scalable and sustainable model for rare disease biorepositories

OBJECTIVE

Rare disease research requires data sharing networks to power translational studies. We describe novel use of Research Electronic Data Capture (REDCap), a web application for managing clinical data, by the National Mesothelioma Virtual Bank, a federated biospecimen, and data sharing network.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

National Mesothelioma Virtual Bank (NMVB) uses REDCap to integrate honest broker activities, enabling biospecimen and associated clinical data provisioning to investigators. A Web Portal Query tool was developed to source and visualize REDCap data in interactive, faceted search, enabling cohort discovery by public users. An AWS Lambda function behind an API calculates the counts visually presented, while protecting record level data. The user-friendly interface, quick responsiveness, automatic generation from REDCap, and flexibility to new data, was engineered to sustain the NMVB research community.

RESULTS

NMVB implementations enabled a network of 8 research institutions with over 2000 mesothelioma cases, including clinical annotations and biospecimens, and public users' cohort discovery and summary statistics. NMVB usage and impact is demonstrated by high website visits (>150 unique queries per month), resource use requests (>50 letter of interests), and citations (>900) to papers published using NMVB resources.

DISCUSSION

NMVB's REDCap implementation and query tool is a framework for implementing federated and integrated rare disease biobanks and registries. Advantages of this framework include being low-cost, modular, scalable, and efficient. Future advances to NVMB's implementations will include incorporation of -omics data and development of downstream analysis tools to advance mesothelioma and rare disease research.

CONCLUSION

NVMB presents a framework for integrating biobanks and patient registries to enable translational research for rare diseases.

Patient Perspectives and Preferences for Consent in the Digital Health Context: State-of-the-art Literature Review

BACKGROUND

The increasing integration of digital health tools into care may result in a greater flow of personal health information (PHI) between patients and providers. Although privacy legislation governs how entities may collect, use, or share PHI, such legislation has not kept pace with digital health innovations, resulting in a lack of guidance on implementing meaningful consent. Understanding patient perspectives when implementing meaningful consent is critical to ensure that it meets their needs. Consent for research in the context of digital health is limited.

OBJECTIVE

This state-of-the-art review aimed to understand the current state of research as it relates to patient perspectives on digital health consent. Its objectives were to explore what is known about the patient perspective and experience with digital health consent and provide recommendations on designing and implementing digital health consent based on the findings.

METHODS

A structured literature search was developed and deployed in 4 electronic databases-MEDLINE, IEEE Xplore, Scopus, and Web of Science-for articles published after January 2010. The initial literature search was conducted in March 2021 and updated in March 2022. Articles were eligible for inclusion if they discussed electronic consent or consent, focused on the patient perspective or preference, and were related to digital health or digital PHI. Data were extracted using an extraction template and analyzed using qualitative content analysis.

RESULTS

In total, 75 articles were included for analysis. Most studies were published within the last 5 years (58/75, 77%) and conducted in a clinical care context (33/75, 44%) and in the United States (48/75, 64%). Most studies aimed to understand participants' willingness to share PHI (25/75, 33%) and participants' perceived usability and comprehension of an electronic consent notice (25/75, 33%). More than half (40/75, 53%) of the studies did not describe the type of consent model used. The broad open consent model was the most explored (11/75, 15%). Of the 75 studies, 68 (91%) found that participants were willing to provide consent; however, their consent behaviors and preferences were context-dependent. Common patient consent requirements included clear and digestible information detailing who can access PHI, for what purpose their PHI will be used, and how privacy will be ensured.

CONCLUSIONS

There is growing interest in understanding the patient perspective on digital health consent in the context of providing clinical care. There is evidence suggesting that many patients are willing to consent for various purposes, especially when there is greater transparency on how the PHI is used and oversight mechanisms are in place. Providing this transparency is critical for fostering trust in digital health tools and the innovative uses of data to optimize health and system outcomes.

Public perceptions and attitudes of the national project of bio-big data: A nationwide survey in the Republic of Korea

Background: The National Project of Bio-Big Data (NPBBD) is a South Korean bio-big data collection project, expected to include health, genomic, and lifelog data of one million Koreans. The Ethical, Legal, and Social Implications study is a parallel study active since 2020. As part of the study, a public survey was conducted to evaluate public attitudes towards engagement schemes, such as public committees and web portals for communication between the public and researchers. Methods: An online survey was conducted from March 3-9, 2021, using structured questionnaires addressed to 1,000 adults aged 20-59 years. Results: Several respondents reported a positive attitude towards participation (43.6% "somewhat," 14.3% "definitely"), whereas approximately one-third (36.5%) reported a neutral attitude. Positive factors that may affect the willingness of the respondents to participate included receiving health information (25.1%), contributing to research on cancer and rare diseases (21.9%), and advancing personalized medicine (21.5%). Conversely, negative factors were mainly associated with concerns regarding the risk of data leakage (22.8%), discrimination (21.1%), lack of information (13.5%), possibility of knowing the risk of being diagnosed with an incurable diseases (12.5%), and possibility of using data in industry (11.3%). In terms of project governance, respondents tended to recognize the importance of public participation in incorporating public opinion into the project design. Conclusion: These results have implications for the participant recruitment process, public engagement strategies, and the scope of user (academics/industry, domestic/overseas) accessibility to the database.

Associations between the Willingness to Donate Samples to Biobanks and Selected Psychological Variables

Over the past few decades, there has been a dynamic development of biobanks collecting human biological material and data. Advances in biomedical research based on biobanks, however, are highly dependent on the successful enrolment and participation of human subjects. Therefore, it is crucial to recognise those factors affecting the willingness of individuals to participate in biomedical research. There are very few studies pointing to the role of trust, preferred values and specific psychological factors. The aim of our study was the analysis of the most significant relationships between selected moral and psychological variables (i.e., preferred values, types of trust and personality) and willingness to donate biological material to biobanks. The research was carried out on a Polish representative national sample of 1100 people over 18 years of age. Statistical methods with regression models were used during the analyses. The willingness to donate samples to a biobank was associated with different types of trust and specific values. Based on regression analysis, the most important factors related to the willingness to donate material to biobanks seemed to be (1) trust towards scientists and doctors and (2) selected preferred values such as knowledge, self-development and tradition. Other values or personality traits did not seem to be as important in this context. The obtained results can be useful in building the social responsibility of biobankers and scientists, issuing more appropriate opinions by research ethics committees and planning better communication strategies between participants and biobanks.

Secondary research use of personal medical data: patient attitudes towards data donation

Background

The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has highlighted once more the great need for comprehensive access to, and uncomplicated use of, pre-existing patient data for medical research. Enabling secondary research-use of patient-data is a prerequisite for the efficient and sustainable promotion of translation and personalisation in medicine, and for the advancement of public-health. However, balancing the legitimate interests of scientists in broad and unrestricted data-access and the demand for individual autonomy, privacy and social justice is a great challenge for patient-based medical research.

Methods

We therefore conducted two questionnaire-based surveys among North-German outpatients (n = 650) to determine their attitude towards data-donation for medical research, implemented as an opt-out-process.

Results

We observed a high level of acceptance (75.0%), the most powerful predictor of a positive attitude towards data-donation was the conviction that every citizen has a duty to contribute to the improvement of medical research (> 80% of participants approving data-donation). Interestingly, patients distinguished sharply between research inside and outside the EU, despite a general awareness that universities and public research institutions cooperate with commercial companies, willingness to allow use of donated data by the latter was very low (7.1% to 29.1%, depending upon location of company). The most popular measures among interviewees to counteract reservations against commercial data-use were regulation by law (61.4%), stipulating in the process that data are not sold or resold (84.6%). A majority requested control of both the use (46.8%) and the protection (41.5%) of the data by independent bodies.

Conclusions

In conclusion, data-donation for medical research, implemented as a combination of legal entitlement and easy-to-exercise-right to opt-out, was found to be widely supported by German patients and therefore warrants further consideration for a transposition into national law.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12910-021-00728-x.

Utilizing a large-scale biobanking registry to assess patient priorities and preferences for cancer research and education

Patients consented to biobanking studies typically do not specify research conducted on their samples and data. Our objective was to gauge cancer biobanking participant preferences on research topics. Patient-participants of a biobanking study at a comprehensive cancer center who had an appointment within the last 5 years, had a valid email address, and with a last known vital status of alive, were emailed a newsletter containing a link to a survey about preferences and priorities for research. The survey assessed demographics and research interest in three domains: cancer site, cancer-related topics, and issues faced by cancer patients. 37,384 participants were contacted through email to participate in the survey. 16,158 participants (43.2%) opened the email, 1,626 (4.3% overall, 10% of those who opened the email) completed the survey, and 1,291 (79.4% of those who completed the survey) selected at least one research priority. Among those who selected at least one research priorities for cancer-relevant topics, the most commonly selected were cancer treatment (66%), clinical trials (54%), and cancer prevention (53%). Similarly, the most selected priorities for cancer-related issues faced by patients were physical side effects of cancer (57%), talking to the oncologist (53%), and emotional challenges due to cancer (47%). Differences by gender were observed, with females reporting more interest in research generally. Cancer patients participating in a biobanking protocol prioritized research on treatments, prevention and side effects, which varied by gender.