Life Sciences Commons^™

The Ethics Of Animal Research: A Survey Of Pediatric Health Care Workers, Ari Joffe, Meredith Bara, Natalie Anton, Nathan Nobis

Experimentation Collection

Introduction: Pediatric health care workers (HCW) often perform, promote, and advocate use of public funds for animal research (AR). We aim to determine whether HCW consider common arguments (and counterarguments) in support (or not) of AR convincing.

Design: After development and validation, an e-mail survey was sent to all pediatricians and pediatric intensive care unit nurses and respiratory therapists (RTs) affiliated with a Canadian University. We presented questions about demographics, support for AR, and common arguments (with their counterarguments) to justify the moral permissibility (or not) of AR. Responses are reported using standard tabulations. Responses of pediatricians and nurses/RTs were …

An Analysis Of The Use Of Animal Models In Predicting Human Toxicology And Drug Safety, Jarrod Bailey, Michelle Thew, Michael Balls

Experimentation Collection

Animal use continues to be central to preclinical drug development, in spite of a lack of its demonstrable validity. The current nadir of new drug approvals and the drying-up of pipelines may be a direct consequence of this. To estimate the evidential weight given by animal data to the probability that a new drug may be toxic to humans, we have calculated Likelihood Ratios (LRs) for an extensive data set of 2,366 drugs, for which both animal and human data are available, including tissue-level effects and MedDRA Level 1–4 biomedical observations. This was done for three preclinical species (rat, mouse …

Medical Training Using Simulation: Toward Fewer Animals And Safer Patients, Jonathan Balcombe

Experimentation Collection

This paper presents the current status of computer-based simulation in medicine. Recent technological advances have enabled this field to emerge from esoteric explorations in academic laboratories to commercially available simulators designed to train users to perform medical procedures from start to finish. Today, more than a dozen companies are producing virtual reality simulators and interactive manikins for training in endoscopy, laparoscopy, anaesthesia, trauma management, angiography, and needle insertion. For many of these procedures, thousands of animals are still being used in training. Yet simulation has many advantages that can transcend scientific, ethical, economic and logistical problems that arise when using …

The Animal Research Controversy: Protest, Process & Public Policy, Andrew N. Rowan, Franklin M. Loew, Joan C. Weer

Experimentation Collection

The controversy today regarding the use of animals in research appears on the surface to be a strongly polarized struggle between the scientific community and the animal protection movement. However, there is a wide range of opinions and philosophies on both sides. Mistrust between the factions has blossomed while communication has withered. Through the 1960s, 1970s and early 1980s, the animal movement grew in numbers and financial resources, and developed much greater public recognition and political clout. The research community paid relatively little attention to the animal movement for much of this period but, alarmed by several public relations coups …

The Ethical Judgment Of Animal Research, Shelley L. Galvin, Harold A. Herzog

Experimentation Collection

One hundred sixty subjects acted as members of a hypothetical Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee and evaluated five proposals in which animals were to be used for research or educational purposes. They were asked to approve or reject the proposals and to indicate what factors were important in reaching their ethical decisions. Gender and differences in personal moral philosophy were related to approval decisions. The reasons given for the decisions fell into three main categories: metacognitive statements, factors related to the animal, and factors related to the design of the experiment.