Dilemas éticos de los biobancos

Abstract

Biobank is a collection of biological samples and linked data intended for diagnosis, therapy and research purposes. The emergence of biobanks in the biological and biomedical field has enabled to reach a major modification in work schemes. It had has a meaningful progress for health sciences, particularly medicine where biobank development allows the availability of a sufficient number of biological samples, stored along their respective socio-demographic and epidemiological data, which facilitates diseases research. However, the activities in biobanks carry ethical and legal dilemmas, which is why their establishment and operation must ensure an appropriate organization and regulation allowing protecting donor rights and recipients’ safety while keeping the researches scientific quality.