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Drivers and constraints to environmental sustainability in UK-based biobanking: balancing resource efficiency and future value

BACKGROUND: Biobanks are a key aspect of healthcare research; they enable access to a wide range of heterogenous samples and data, as well as saving individual researchers time and funds on the collection, storage and/or curation of such resources. However, biobanks are also associated with impacts...

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Autores principales: Samuel, Gabrielle, Sims, Jessica M
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10236775/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37264320
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12910-023-00908-x
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author Samuel, Gabrielle
Sims, Jessica M
author_facet Samuel, Gabrielle
Sims, Jessica M
author_sort Samuel, Gabrielle
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description BACKGROUND: Biobanks are a key aspect of healthcare research; they enable access to a wide range of heterogenous samples and data, as well as saving individual researchers time and funds on the collection, storage and/or curation of such resources. However, biobanks are also associated with impacts associated with a depletion of natural resources (energy, water etc.) production of toxic chemicals during manufacturing of laboratory equipment, and effects on biodiversity. We wanted to better understand the biobanking sector in the UK as a first step to assessing the environmental impacts of UK biobanking. METHODS: We explored the sample storage infrastructure and environmental sustainability practices at a number of UK biobanks through a mixed methods quantitative and qualitative approach, including information gathering on an online platform, and eight in-depth interviews. RESULTS: Environmental sustainability was deprioritised behind biobanks’ financial sustainability practices. Nevertheless, both often aligned in practice. However, there was a tendency towards underutilisation of stored samples, the avoidance of centralisation, and providing accessibility to biosamples, and this conflicted with valuing sustainability goals. This related to notions of individualised and competitive biobanking culture. Furthermore, the study raised how value attachments to biosamples overshadows needs for both financial and environmental sustainability concerns. CONCLUSIONS: We need to move away from individualised and competitive biobanking cultures towards a realisation that the health of the publics and patients should be first and foremost. We need to ensure the use of biosamples, ahead of their storage (‘smart attachments’), align with environmental sustainability goals and participants’ donation wishes for biosample use. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12910-023-00908-x.
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spelling pubmed-102367752023-06-03 Drivers and constraints to environmental sustainability in UK-based biobanking: balancing resource efficiency and future value Samuel, Gabrielle Sims, Jessica M BMC Med Ethics Research BACKGROUND: Biobanks are a key aspect of healthcare research; they enable access to a wide range of heterogenous samples and data, as well as saving individual researchers time and funds on the collection, storage and/or curation of such resources. However, biobanks are also associated with impacts associated with a depletion of natural resources (energy, water etc.) production of toxic chemicals during manufacturing of laboratory equipment, and effects on biodiversity. We wanted to better understand the biobanking sector in the UK as a first step to assessing the environmental impacts of UK biobanking. METHODS: We explored the sample storage infrastructure and environmental sustainability practices at a number of UK biobanks through a mixed methods quantitative and qualitative approach, including information gathering on an online platform, and eight in-depth interviews. RESULTS: Environmental sustainability was deprioritised behind biobanks’ financial sustainability practices. Nevertheless, both often aligned in practice. However, there was a tendency towards underutilisation of stored samples, the avoidance of centralisation, and providing accessibility to biosamples, and this conflicted with valuing sustainability goals. This related to notions of individualised and competitive biobanking culture. Furthermore, the study raised how value attachments to biosamples overshadows needs for both financial and environmental sustainability concerns. CONCLUSIONS: We need to move away from individualised and competitive biobanking cultures towards a realisation that the health of the publics and patients should be first and foremost. We need to ensure the use of biosamples, ahead of their storage (‘smart attachments’), align with environmental sustainability goals and participants’ donation wishes for biosample use. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12910-023-00908-x. BioMed Central 2023-06-01 /pmc/articles/PMC10236775/ /pubmed/37264320 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12910-023-00908-x Text en © The Author(s) 2023 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
spellingShingle Research
Samuel, Gabrielle
Sims, Jessica M
Drivers and constraints to environmental sustainability in UK-based biobanking: balancing resource efficiency and future value
title Drivers and constraints to environmental sustainability in UK-based biobanking: balancing resource efficiency and future value
title_full Drivers and constraints to environmental sustainability in UK-based biobanking: balancing resource efficiency and future value
title_fullStr Drivers and constraints to environmental sustainability in UK-based biobanking: balancing resource efficiency and future value
title_full_unstemmed Drivers and constraints to environmental sustainability in UK-based biobanking: balancing resource efficiency and future value
title_short Drivers and constraints to environmental sustainability in UK-based biobanking: balancing resource efficiency and future value
title_sort drivers and constraints to environmental sustainability in uk-based biobanking: balancing resource efficiency and future value
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10236775/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37264320
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12910-023-00908-x
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