This November, we had the chance to travel to Graz and attend the second in-person Consortium Meeting, hosted by the BBMRI.at coordination (from the Medical University of Graz. Our Team was kindly invited by Biobank Graz to tour their facilities before the meeting: from their laboratories (where liquid samples were being separated into aliquots) to the below-ground, flood protected sample storage rooms, our UNIVIE Team got a close look at highly automated liquid storage facilities and got precious insight into the process of sample collection, processing, storage and access management within Biobank Graz.
A section of the agenda of the Consortium Meeting was dedicated to a Workshop, organised by our Team, with focus on “Understanding Broad Consent in Biobanking”. We covered consent types in biobanking, including the advantages and disadvantages of each type of consent model and presented the concept of consent with each of the 3 structural legal European Union (EU) acts on the topic: the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the Data Governance Act and the upcoming European Health Data Space (EHDS) Regulation (which we had covered on a previous Workshop). To cater to the Workshop audience, great emphasis was placed on the Austrian context: we covered the GDPR requirements and their implementation in Austria, Consent in Austrian Research Organisation Act (Forschungsorganisationsgesetz), the Austrian Data Protection Act (Datenschutzgesetz) and Gene Technology Act (Gentechnikgesetz).
In order to be further aligned with the BBMRI.at objectives, the Workshop was followed-up by a discussion of each of the Consortium’s Biobanks informed consent practices. This was a useful step to frame the discussion, led by Research Prof. Priv.-Doz. Dr.med.univ. Dr.rer.nat. Luka Brcic (BBMRI.at National Node Coordinator & Deputy National Node Director), on the potential of creating harmonised informed consent practices and forms within Austria.
Further insight into the Consortium Meeting’s activities can be found in the BBMRI.at’s news article covering the event.
