Evolution of informed consent in research: From the Hippocratic Oath to the tailored consent.

In many cases, the IC has served to protect the investigator or sponsor from complaints. Different ethical guidelines have sought to make the IC a more useful tool, with little success. Today's IC is mainly a bureaucratic and legal process that fails to consider the patient's point of view. In this context, the Guidelines for Tailoring the Informed Consent Process in Clinical Studies provide alternatives to the current IC process, focusing on the patient's opinions and making them part of the process, thereby improving clinical research quality.