Publikationsdatenbank

Refinement in Laboratory Animal Science education:
an inquiry concerning the use of rat and mouse simulators among LAS instructors (2019)

Art

Vortrag

Autoren

Humpenöder, Melanie (WE 11)

Corte, Giuliano Mario (WE 1)

Pfützner, Marcel (WE 1)

Ladwig-Wiegard, Mechthild (WE 11)

Merle, Roswitha (WE 16)

Plendl, Johanna (WE 1)

Thöne-Reineke, Christa (WE 11)

Kongress

19th Annual Congress of EUSAAT

Linz, 10. – 13.10.2019

Quelle

ALTEX proceedings

Bandzählung: 8

Heftzählung: 1

Seiten: 81

ISSN: 2194-0479

Sprache

Englisch

Verweise

URL (Volltext): http://www.altex.ch/resources/altex_Linz2019_full.pdf

Kontakt

Institut für Veterinär-Epidemiologie und Biometrie

Königsweg 67
14163 Berlin
+49 30 838 56034
epi@vetmed.fu-berlin.de

Abstract / Zusammenfassung

Qualified education of persons involved in animal experiments is, in itself, a means of applied refinement in Laboratory Animal Science (LAS). This is implemented in practice by LAS courses in which ba-sic theoretical knowledge is taught and essential manual skills are trained prior to working with live animals. Since, to date, none of the available alternative methods can fully provide an adequate acquisi-tion of practical skills under realistic conditions, most courses pre-dominantly include training involving live animals, usually rats and mice. According to the Directive 2010/63/EU, this training is catego-rized as an animal experiment and the implementation of the 3Rs is requested [1]. A further refinement strategy is the use of simulators prior to training with live animals, by which the stressful impact of training procedures on the animals can be reduced to an indispens-able minimum. Currently, five rat simulators and one mouse simu-lator for first practice in handling and procedural techniques and one rat simulator for microsurgical techniques are commercially avail-able on the international market. Since only few data concerning the suitability and efficiency of these simulators exist, a team of scien-tists from the Department of Veterinary Medicine, Freie Universität Berlin, set out to systemically evaluate all currently available rat and mouse simulators in a multi-perspective approach.

In order to investigate the implementation and suitability of rat and mouse simulators in LAS courses, a questionnaire for trainers and advisers was developed concerning the use of and satisfac-tion with these simulators. Furthermore, requirements for the im-provement of future simulators were determined. The survey, in which 37 course trainers and advisers from Germany and neigh-boring countries took part in, was accessible online from 2018-05-31 until 2019-06-30 and is currently being statistically ana-lyzed. The outcome of which will be presented at the EUSAAT congress in October 2019.