We did a student project - which included a questionnaire and anthropometric measurements. Since it was a student project, and the topic was decided in a short time, we did not take an ethical approval from our institute committee. Our institute doesn't have a provision for fast track approvals for student projects.
But we took a written informed consent for each participant. Since we got interesting results (unexpexted) we thought of publishing our study. The institute ethical committe denied a post hoc approval.
Do surveys actually require an ethical approval from a journal point of a view?
Since we have the forms of informed consent, aren't they sufficient?
If none work out, is there a repository for unpublished work like ArXiv in epidemiology?