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Mixing Therapy with Research: On Shaky Ground

The earthquake in 2005 hitting the northern areas of Pakistan, Kashmir and India was one of the most devastating natural calamities the region has seen in recent memory. As a general surgeon volunteering for the Pakistan Medical Association, I was working in a makeshift camp hospital created in a school near a small town called Mansehra where we provided medical services in a severely compromised situation. Our patients, mostly women and children, were being operated upon on school desks joined together in class rooms because that was all we could offer. A group of psychiatrists led by an eminent clinical psychiatrist and senior faculty of a university hospital visited our camp and extended their services to provide help to our patients by talking to them as a means of relieving their post-traumatic stress and depression. Since we were already shorthanded and all the patients looked extremely depressed and in need for psychotherapy, the psychiatrists were readily welcomed. They started coming to our camp every afternoon and taking sessions with a few patients every day. After a few days, however, I realised that these doctors were also filling in questionnaires and collecting blood samples while conducting their “sessions”. I inquired with one of the psychiatrist doctors who said that this was part of an ongoing research. She also informed me that their group was conducting similar work in almost all the surrounding camps. Concerned by the implications of this research, I informed my senior associate about it but he found it justifiable under the situation. He said, “In the current circumstances, we need all the help we can get and if the earthquake survivors are getting the benefit of having counsellors talk to them and providing much needed relief, then we should not create hurdles.” He continued, “Asking a few questions and giving a few millilitres of blood is not going to C A S E C O R N E R