An apparently successful stem-cell treatment for urinary incontinence is now being questioned after it has emerged that clinical trials for the therapy may have been done illegally....
The independent ethics committee that approves and oversees clinical trials at the university and hospital is now concerned that the clinical trial of the procedure's efficacy, carried out by Strasser's team and published in The Lancet last June, may have been illegal. The Ministry of Health is now investigating claims by the ethics committee that it was never contacted, as law requires, about the trial on 63 women who were recruited between 2002 and 2004.

Despite a number of key advances, such as the introduction of registration of controlled trials, use of applicable CONSORT statements, and more rigorous checking at various levels from ethics committees and journal editors, it is clear that some research is still conducted in violation of fairly basic ethical standards.