Labour Exploitation Trafficking and Migrant Health

• Anonymity and confidentiality through coding and secure data storage and publication; 29
• Referral options to problems reported by interviewees; 30
• Emergency security responses for interviewees and researchers. 31
Ethical approval for the study was granted by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and
by local ethics boards. In Argentina, approval was granted by the Hospital de Clínicas “José de San
Martín”, a teaching hospital that is part of the University of Buenos Aires. In Peru, ethical approval
was granted by the ethics committee of the Cayetano Heredia University. In Kazakhstan, the School
of Public Health’s Ethics Committee approved the EXTRMHE study.
29
The information provided by participants was confidential. In some situations, however, it could have been necessary to disclose
personal information without a participant’s consent (where a failure to do so may expose the participant or others, for example,
their children, to risk of death or serious harm). This was explained on the participant information sheet and was discussed with all
participants as part of the informed consent process. All participants were made aware of these limits to confidentiality as part of
the informed consent process. The researchers were to contact their line manager (local study lead) to discuss all situations where
confidentiality might have had to be breached. However, we did not need to do this in any of the cases. All participants were assigned
a unique ID number and referred to only by this number during management of the research data. Electronic data that identified
individuals was stored separately from the research data.
30
Participants were closely monitored during interviews for signs of distress and, if signs of distress were observed, appropriate action
was taken, including asking the participant if he or she would like to take a short break, offering to complete the interview at another
time, skipping questions that caused particular distress or terminating the interview. All participants were offered information about
the services that IOM could provide or received referrals for various additional forms of assistance through non-IOM service providers.
31
Fieldwork staff followed strict procedures for checking in and checking out before and after interviews to ensure their safety in the
field. If possible, interviews were conducted at IOM offices, at local support organizations (such as shelters in Kazakhstan) or health
services (for example, La Caravana de la Vida in Madre de Dios, or a local hospital in Buenos Aires).
Labour Exploitation, Trafficking and Migrant Health
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