Animal Labs

[Allerian1004]

Which schools still use animal labs? That article posted yesterday mentioned 12. What are the 12? I know MCW is one but none of the others were listed.

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[AnEyeLikeMars]

Which schools still use animal labs? That article posted yesterday mentioned 12. What are the 12? I know MCW is one but none of the others were listed.

I think it was 14. I'm interested in this too. It doesn't matter to me that the dogs are going to be euthanized anyway, I just couldn't do it.

 

[notdeadyet]

It doesn't matter to me that the dogs are going to be euthanized anyway, I just couldn't do it.

Agreed. The idea of a medical student killing dogs for the sake of playing around with their organs while it dies is pretty nuts to me.

There are valid arguments about using animals in actual experiments for the furthering of medicine. I think you could also make a pretty good argument about using animals in surgical residency programs and fellowships.

But med students? C'mon. Even at the medical schools that use them, I've yet to hear a compelling argument. It's fun hearing professors at these schools talk about the "impact" of seeing a heart slowly stop beating and the "appreciation" of watching blood course through the veins.

The teaching of medicine is just a conservative practice and many schools have been slow to change with the time (look at the curriculum at some of these schools).

 

[notdeadyet]

I think it was 14. I'm interested in this too.

Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences School of Medicine
University of Mississippi Medical Center School of Medicine
St. Louis University School of Medicine
Washington University in St. Louis School of Medicine
New York Medical College
Stony Brook University Health Sciences Center School of Medicine
Duke University School of Medicine
East Carolina University-The Brody School of Medicine
Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine
Oregon Health & Science University
University of Tennessee, Memphis, College of Medicine
Medical College of Wisconsin
University of Wisconsin Medical School

On the upside, a vast majority of schools have abandoned the practice over the last few years. I'm sure that most of these schools will to in the coming years.

 

[MomTo2Boys]

WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!


OHSU!?!?!!?!!? For real? OHSU? Are you sure?

 

[MomTo2Boys]

Could somone please post a link to the article that mentioned this that was discussed yesterday? I cannot find it. Thanks!

 

[braluk]

Its literally the first article on the front page but here ya go

http://www.studentdoctor.net/?p=104

 

[notdeadyet]

OHSU!?!?!!?!!? For real? OHSU? Are you sure?

You might address your concerns with one of the OHSU threads, but I believe that most of the schools on this list have the animal lab as optional. In some schools, you can opt out and in others you have to opt in.

 

[reverend doc]

I am so incredibly disappointed that Case is on this list. There is no way I am doing this next year. I am sure that touching a beating heart is an "invaluable experience," in what way is a dog's life not more invaluable? 12 years of life versus an hour of my education?

I will be the first to say it: my education is not worth it.

 

[green453]

It isn't on the list, but as part of a class I took my junior year, we attended an open heart surgery on a sheep, performed by med students (may have been residents, I can't remember). I attended UPenn as an undergrad, so I would expect that you need to add Penn to the list.

Edit: I should probably clarify that we didn't see all of the surgery. We (the undergrads in my class) were supposed to be looking at the technological side of things, so we were actually there to see the heart-lung machine and anesthetic machines in action. Furthermore, I'm not sure of whether the surgery was terminal or non-terminal. If it was non-terminal, that is (in my mind), worse in many ways than euthanizing the animal afterward.

I just read the article, and it mentioned that Penn doesn't use live animal labs. I don't know if this is because of a recent change in policy (the surgery I attended was Spring '05), that the class wasn't offered to the med school as a whole (only ~6 people participating in the surgery, not counting people observing), or if I'm totally screwed up in my memory and the surgery was being performed by residents. If it was performed by residents, I think it is kind of deceptive to say that Penn doesn't use live animal labs. I don't know though all the details though, so I won't say too much.

Just as a bit of opinion, I have to say that I think there is a lot of benefit to live animal labs. I've never participated in one, but I can tell you from experience that I have a much better understanding of how to perform surgery on a mouse after working with live animals (current lab) than fixed animals (undergrad biology lab). There are a lot of aspects of physiology that can't be grasped without the real thing. Additionally, anesthesia, from which the animal never wakes up, doesn't really effect the animal. If it will be euthanized anyway, what is the objection to learning from it before it dies, if you aren't putting it into any kind of distress? I'm not arguing that we should be repeating the early experiments in cardiac function (jabbing a pipe into a horse's artery to measure blood pressure anyone?), but if the animals are treated well, I think the benefit of preparing doctors better able to treat humans if infinitely more valuable than just killing a dog without gaining any knowledge in the process.

Just my two cents...

 

[melissainsd]

WHAT?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!


OHSU!?!?!!?!!? For real? OHSU? Are you sure?

My thoughts exactly. I have dogs...I couldn't do it. I also think that it is more valuable to shadow during a human surgery than to watch a dog.

Oh, and if you google boycott OHSU or even just OHSU, you can see they have very controversial primate labs. I am all for animal labs (even worked in a few), but apparently their labs are very inhumane. And I really like OHSU

 

[MomTo2Boys]

Inhumane primate labs? Oh dear GOD. I would never, ever survive. Ever. I could not even Google that, let alone be there with it. It would just be the end of me. Maybe I am just a wimp. An old, clueless wimp. I would totally admit to that. But just the WORDS "inhumane primate lab" are too much for me.

And in the end, I swear ~ truly ~ that I understand that I have no right to whine and comlain about surgery on dogs that are about to be euthanized. I know that it can be said that since they are about to be euthanized anyway that they might as well be used for science... that they are put under and do not feel it... that they might as well be used so that someone can learn from them... but dear GOD it just seems so WRONG. So very wrong.

And yes, this from someone who just baked chicken nuggets for her children for lunch (although I have been trying really really hard to go vegan). Did I think that chicken just climbed into the nuggets box by itself? Of course it did not. So who am I to judge the use of doomed dogs for surgery purposes? Hell, I have even been involved in organized dog rescue before, and have had to have two aggressive, non-rehabilitatable (is that even a word?) dogs euthanized because they could never successfully be in families because of their behavior (biting). But it broke my heart and my own wonderful dog was adopted as an adult from the pound. I just could not do it.

"Inhumane primate labs" is just going to haunt me.

 

[RollSkins]

I definitely would not be too happy about having to participate in one of these labs, lucklily none of the schools which I am applying to are listed. I have done a rabbit surgery lab in undergrad and it didn't bother me any but it just seems different with a dog. Its probably because I have one and rabbits don't do anything but stink anyway.

 

[RollSkins]

I definitely would not be too happy about having to participate in one of these labs, lucklily none of the schools which I am applying to are listed. I have done a rabbit surgery lab in undergrad and it didn't bother me any but it just seems different with a dog. Its probably because I have one and rabbits don't do anything but stink anyway.

 

[RollSkins]

Sorry about the double post I don't know how that happened and I don't know how to delete it. Also I read a good article about this in Good Medicine about how alot of schools are abandoning the practice due to certian organizations speaking out.

 

[notdeadyet]

I also think that it is more valuable to shadow during a human surgery than to watch a dog. (

I think you hit the nail on the head, melissainsd.

The fact that only 14 allopathic medical schools use live animal labs for A&P shows something. If there was any compelling evidence that it improved medical education, you'd see a lot more. I'd say a good 10% of SDN would saw the head off a live cat if it would bump up their Step 1 by five points.

 

[melissainsd]

Inhumane primate labs? Oh dear GOD. I would never, ever survive. Ever. I could not even Google that, let alone be there with it. It would just be the end of me. Maybe I am just a wimp. An old, clueless wimp. I would totally admit to that. But just the WORDS "inhumane primate lab" are too much for me.

And in the end, I swear ~ truly ~ that I understand that I have no right to whine and comlain about surgery on dogs that are about to be euthanized. I know that it can be said that since they are about to be euthanized anyway that they might as well be used for science... that they are put under and do not feel it... that they might as well be used so that someone can learn from them... but dear GOD it just seems so WRONG. So very wrong.

And yes, this from someone who just baked chicken nuggets for her children for lunch (although I have been trying really really hard to go vegan). Did I think that chicken just climbed into the nuggets box by itself? Of course it did not. So who am I to judge the use of doomed dogs for surgery purposes? Hell, I have even been involved in organized dog rescue before, and have had to have two aggressive, non-rehabilitatable (is that even a word?) dogs euthanized because they could never successfully be in families because of their behavior (biting). But it broke my heart and my own wonderful dog was adopted as an adult from the pound. I just could not do it.

"Inhumane primate labs" is just going to haunt me.

Ya, I couldn't bring myself to look at the pics on the site. It just really bummed me out that a school I thought very highly of was participating in stuff like that. It must be bad if people are actually changing their PCP to avoid OHSU. I don't know...it would be silly of me to turn them down just to have them abolish the labs in the next year or two. It just makes me sad.

 

[lord_jeebus]

UCSD has an elective animal lab, which I chose to take. At the time I figured that if the animals were going to be sacrificed anyway (others had already signed up), I may as well get something out of it.

The quality of the conceptual learning of physiology and pharmacology I got from that lab was simply incomparable. Every year the lab coordinators must prove to the IRB that the same learning experience cannot be provided with a computer simulation or other method, and every year they are successful.

Did it help me on Step 1? Who cares, maybe. Will this understanding help me when I go into anesthesia? Probably.

Much more productive for me than the animals that have died so that I could eat a tasty steak or pork chop.

 

[Orthodoc40]

I would refuse to participate in any type of live animal lab, aka vivesection. There is nothing they could do to convince me it is invaluable to my education. With all the technology available today, it is truly unnecessary. I have no hesitation on this one, and no argument, no pressuring, no threats would budge me on my views.

 

[BellyDancingDoc]

I am so incredibly disappointed that Case is on this list. There is no way I am doing this next year. I am sure that touching a beating heart is an "invaluable experience," in what way is a dog's life not more invaluable? 12 years of life versus an hour of my education?

I will be the first to say it: my education is not worth it.

I feel you, rev!!!

 

[goongirl]

I am so incredibly disappointed that Case is on this list. There is no way I am doing this next year. I am sure that touching a beating heart is an "invaluable experience," in what way is a dog's life not more invaluable? 12 years of life versus an hour of my education?
*
I will be the first to say it: my education is not worth it.

I just wanted to say that I'm a first year at case and have never heard of us even offering an optional animal dissection lab. People here would definitely be talking/debating it if we did. We do have several optional human cadaver dissection labs though (like surgical anatomy and technique).

 

[pagemmapants]

I haven't heard a dang thing about animal labs here. Can anyone confirm or deny what was stated above?

 

[MonkeyNuts!]

I'm confused what do you mean animal lab. You mean labs that use animals? Or like undergraduate lab courses like orgo lab but with animals?

I didn't hear of one at JHU, but I was an engineer so I dunno.

 

[notdeadyet]

I'm confused what do you mean animal lab. You mean labs that use animals? Or like undergraduate lab courses like orgo lab but with animals?

The list above are the medical schools that still use live animal laboratories to train medical students basic concepts in physiology/pharm/surgery. The list doesn't include schools that use animals for research.

If you feel that your school doesn't belong on that list, I'd recommend getting a Dean to put it in writing, then notify any of the animal rights groups that position this list, or PCRM, who I believe maintains it. They'd be happy to remove a school if they've updated their policy, as it would demonstrate progress for them.