VCU Human Research Protection Program (HRPP) Blog

The VCU HRPP is dedicated to facilitating ethically and scientifically sound research through robust review of research projects and through effective education and outreach to the VCU research community.

On Wednesday, September 15th, RAMS-IRB went offline to undergo a system upgrade. After it came back online yesterday, we identified an issue with the uploaded documents appearing as blank or not being able to be opened, and we are working to correct the issue and restore those documents. However, it is taking longer than anticipated. 

We are requesting that all investigators delay submitting to the IRB until after we have finished correcting this issue. If your submission (or resubmission) involves any new or revised documents, we do not want to risk compounding the problem with newly uploaded documents as we work to restore the previously uploaded documents. 

You may also experience brief periods that RAMS-IRB is taken offline while IT works on the system, but you will receive a pop-up warning that this is about to happen. Be sure to save your work at that time. 

Submissions that are already under IRB review may experience delays in the review process because our staff and reviewers are currently unable to access and review the uploaded documents. Contact your study’s assigned IRB coordinator if you have any questions or concerns about this. 

If you have an urgent need to access a document from RAMS-IRB (e.g. a stamped consent document), please contact your study’s assigned IRB Coordinator. They can work with IT to retrieve the necessary document for you. 

Another posting will be sent when the issue is resolved and you may submit again, and we hope that this delay will only be for a short period.

We appreciate your patience and apologize for the delays. 

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