Ethics and HTA Requirements

All human tissue collected from donors by ETHICAL TISSUE has full ethical approval, and is handled within the conditions of the ethical approval gained, in accordance with the requirements of the Human Tissue Act 2004 and under the governance of the Human Tissue Authority (HTA) Licence granted in 2007. In addition, full approval is sought by ETHICAL TISSUE from the research and development governance associated with each NHS Trust or other collaborator involved in sample acquisition.

ETHICAL TISSUE is authorised to ethically approve biomedical research projects that fall within this governance structure. Researchers receiving samples from ETHICAL TISSUE are not required to have individual project based ethical approval from NRES.

Researchers using samples provided by ETHICAL TISSUE are not required to work under a licence from the Human Tissue Authority (HTA), providing a Supply Agreement (Material Transfer Agreement) between the research group and ETHICAL TISSUE has been signed.