Risks of Schizophrenia clinical trials for children affects people of every category and especially children. Children are delicate and tough to handle. Many issues are surrounding them that are difficult to comprehend. Children cannot tell what they face in daily life. Caregivers and parents have to understand their problems and act accordingly. Though it is non-curable, schizophrenia demands specific use of medication as well as varied support of clinical trials.
There are several advantages and disadvantages to the usage of clinical trials. The new therapy may cause dangerous side effects or be painful, or the latest treatment may not work, or it may not be better than conventional treatment. Early-intervention clinical trials concerning children at risk for schizophrenia raise a variety of moral issues. These concerns range from some of the most customary questions of upright principles and research ethics to some selective pragmatic questions about optimal approaches for preserving subjects. Scientists get expected to take steps to induce potential risks of schizophrenia medication in children. The various risks of schizophrenia clinical trials that have haunted the development of clinical trials are follows-
Physical Risks
Physical hazards include physical distress, pain, injury, ailment, or disease brought about by the practices and procedures of the research. Children are always prone to such threats. A physical peril may result from the preoccupation of physical stimuli such as noise, electric shock, heat, cold, electronic magnetic or gravitational domains, etc. Engaging a child in a social position that could involve injury may also create physical jeopardy.
Psychological risks
Schizophrenia is more of a mental burden to a child. Psychological threats include the return of negative affective states such as anxiety, sadness, guilt, confusion, and loss of self-esteem and modified behavior. Sensory withholding, sleep loss, use of hypnosis, betrayal, or mental stresses are examples of psychological risks that children face in daily life but are difficult to access.
Social, Economical risks
Social or economic risks in children include modifications in relationships with adults that are to the disadvantage of the subject. These include confusion, loss of respect of others, labeling the child in a way that will have adverse consequences, or in some way, trying to reduce those opportunities and powers a character has under relationships with others. Economic uncertainties include payment by parents for procedures not otherwise required, lack of wages or other income, and any financial losses, such as damage to parent employability, as an outcome of participation in the research. It can have diverse effects on the continuation of therapy for children where the cost gets born by the parents instead. Such an outcome is undesirable, and it cannot get helped.
Loss of Confidentiality
In all investigations involving human subjects, particularly children, the confidentiality of identifiable knowledge is presumed and must be sustained unless the investigator receives the express permission of the child to do otherwise. It is a menace as the children do not have control over their will power, and such information is likely to get disclosed to family, friends, and acquaintances. Children possess the right to be protected against injury or illegal intrusions of their privacy. They also have the right to preservation of their dignity. The degree of sensitivity of the research material demands cares that must get exercised in collecting, handling, and storing data. To reduce the risk of loss of confidentiality, researchers should only gather personal information that is necessary for the research activity. If knowledge must be collected, it should be encrypted as early as possible and securely saved so that only the investigator and approved staff may obtain it.
Names of individual children must never get released without the specific consent of the child. Besides, if an analyst wishes to use data for a goal other than the one for which it got collected originally and the data are still identifiable (e.g. a code list for the data still exists), the investigator may need to receive consent from the children for the new use of the information. Children do not possess the ability to understand this problem. It gets used against them at a later period to their disadvantage.
Legal Risks
Legal risks exist in the case of clinical trials of schizophrenia get conducted. These take the form when the research designs are such that the children will be liable for a violation of the law. It is unjustifiable because the children have no idea about what they are pursuing. It can also be either by exposing that the child or others have or will engage in behavior for which the minor or others may be criminally or civilly liable or by challenging activities for which the kid or others may be criminally or civilly liable. It is harsh on their part as they nothing about the violation of the law.
The various symptoms and risks of schizophrenia regarding the legality, physicality, psychological, social, and economic reasons may prove to be a bane. Clinical trials have to readjust their programs and policies so that children do not get affected by such issues.