Refinement Database

Database on Refinement of Housing, Husbandry, Care, and Use of Animals in Research

This database, created in 2000, is updated every four months with newly published scientific articles, books, and other publications related to improving or safeguarding the welfare of animals used in research.

Tips for using the database:

  • This landing page displays all of the publications in the database.
  • Use the drop-down menus to filter these publications by Animal Type, Setting, and/or Topic.
  • Clicking on a parent category (e.g., Rodent) will include publications relating to all the items in that category (e.g., Chinchilla, Gerbil, Guinea Pig, etc.).
  • You may also add a keyword to further narrow your search.
  • Please note that at this time, only publications dated 2010 or later (with some exceptions) can be filtered by Animal Type and Topic, and only publications dated 2020 or later (with some exceptions) can be filtered by Setting. Most publications older than 2010 can only be searched by keyword. 
Bennett, T. E., Pavek, T. J., Schwark, W. S. et al. 2021. Comparison of nociceptive effects of buprenorphine, firocoxib, and meloxicam in a plantar incision model in Sprague–Dawley rats. JAALAS 60(5), 539-548.

Due to their reduced frequency of dosing and ease of availability, NSAIDs are generally preferred over opioids for rodent analgesia. We evaluated the efficacy of the highly COX2-selective NSAID firocoxib as compared with meloxicam and...

Hausmann, J. C., Krisp, A. R., Mans, C. et al. 2021. Analgesic efficacy of tramadol and morphine in White's tree frogs (Litoria caerulea). JAALAS 60(6), 681-686.

Published data are sparse regarding the recognition of clinically relevant pain and appropriate analgesia in amphibians. The amphibian analgesia literature has primarily focused on nociceptive pathways in a single species, the northern leopard frog (Rana...

Furumoto, K., Ogita, K., Kamisaka, T. et al. 2021. Effects of multimodal analgesic protocol, with buprenorphine and meloxicam, on mice well-being: A dose finding study. Animals 11(12), 3420.

The anesthetic or analgesic agent of choice, route and frequency of anesthetic or analgesic administration, and stressors induce distress during the perioperative period. We evaluated a multimodal analgesic protocol using buprenorphine and meloxicam on the...

Small, A., Fetiveau, M., Smith, R. et al. 2021. Three studies evaluating the potential for lidocaine, bupivacaine or procaine to reduce pain-related behaviors following ring castration and/or tail docking in lambs. Animals 11(12), 3583.

The use of local anesthesia at the time of ring castration and tail docking can improve lamb welfare. However, few local anesthetics are registered for sheep, and data on their duration of effect is limited...

Harris, C., White, P., Mohler, V. et al. 2020. Electroencephalography can distinguish between pain and anaesthetic intervention in conscious lambs undergoing castration. Animals 10(3), 428.

Australian sheep routinely undergo painful surgical husbandry procedures without anaesthesia or analgesia. Electroencephalography (EEG) has been shown to be a successful measure of pain in livestock under a general anaesthetic. The aim of this study...

Kells, N. J., Beausoleil, N. J., Godfrey, A. J. R. et al. 2020. Effect of analgesic strategies on pain behaviour associated with combined ring castration and hot iron tail docking in Merino lambs. Applied Animal Behaviour Science 222, 104914.

Most countries don’t require analgesia to be provided to lambs

Alemán-Laporte, J., Bandini, L. A., Garcia-Gomes, M. S. et al. 2020. Combination of ketamine and xylazine with opioids and acepromazine in rats: Physiological changes and their analgesic effect analysed by ultrasonic vocalization. Laboratory Animals 54(2), 171–182.

In this study, the effect of four anaesthetic protocols that included the combination of xylazine (X) and ketamine (K) with acepromazine (A) and opioids (methadone (Me), morphine (Mo) or tramadol (T)) was evaluated in laboratory...

Forrest, G., Sattar, A., Evenden, P. et al. 2020. A sweet change to the needle. Animal Technology and Welfare 19(1), 73-75.

The Named Veterinary Surgeon (NVS) at the Royal Veterinary College in London suggested providing post-operative pain relief (carprofen) to rats in raspberry flavoured jelly to avoid the use of s.c. injections. This article provides a...

Foley, P. L., Kendall, L. V., Turner, P. V. 2019. Clinical management of pain in rodents. Comparative Medicine 69(6), 468–489.

The use of effective regimens for mitigating pain remain underutilized in research rodents despite the general acceptance of both the ethical imperative and regulatory requirements intended to maximize animal welfare. Factors contributing to this gap...

Smith J. C. 2019. A review of strain and sex differences in response to pain and analgesia in mice. Comparative Medicine 69(6), 490–500.

Pain and its alleviation are currently a highly studied issue in human health. Research on pain and response to analgesia has evolved to include the effects of genetics, heritability, and sex as important components in...

Reinhardt, V. (ed.) 2020. It’s Okay to Cry - Discussions by the Laboratory Animal Refinement & Enrichment Forum [LAREF], Volume V. Animal Welfare Institute, Washington, DC.

This is the 5th volume of selected discussions that took place on the electronic Laboratory Animal Refinement & Enrichment Forum between February 2016 and December 2019. The forum was created in October 2002; it allows...

Zude, B. P., Jampachaisri, K., Pacharinsak, C. 2020. Use of flavored tablets of gabapentin and carprofen to attenuate postoperative hypersensitivity in an incisional pain model in rats (Rattus norvegicus). JAALAS 59(2), 163–169.

Providing postoperative analgesia to rats by oral administration, compared with injections, reduces stress from frequent handling and is technically easier for investigators. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether bacon-flavored tablets containing gabapentin...

Ferrer, L. M., Lacasta, D., Ortín, A. et al. 2020. Impact of a topical anaesthesia wound management formulation on pain, inflammation and reduction of secondary infections after tail docking in lambs. Animals 10(8), 1255.

We examined several procedures for surgical tail docking; with and without general anaesthesia (GA), including the use of a topical wound gel formulation to provide pain relief (PR) and improve healing after surgery, containing local...

Grant, E. P., Wickham, S. L., Anderson, F. et al. 2020. Preliminary findings on a novel behavioural approach for the assessment of pain and analgesia in lambs subject to routine husbandry procedures. Animals 10(7), 1148.

The identification and assessment of pain in sheep under field conditions are important, but, due to their stoic nature, are fraught with many challenges. In Australia, various husbandry procedures that are documented to cause pain...

Andrews, D. D., Fajt, V. R., Baker, K. C. et al. 2020. A comparison of buprenorphine, sustained release buprenorphine, and high concentration buprenorphine in male New Zealand white rabbits. JAALAS 59(5), 546-556.

Pain management in rabbits can be difficult because they are adept at hiding pain and can be stressed by handling and restraint for injection. The use of opioid analgesics with prolonged durations of activity could...

Stewart, L. A., Imai, D. M., Beckett, L. et al. 2020. Injection-site reactions to sustained-release meloxicam in Sprague–Dawley rats. JAALAS 59(6), 726-731.

An extended-release formulation of the NSAID meloxicam (MSR) is used to provide 72 h of continuous analgesia in many species, including rodents. Although standard formulations of meloxicam are frequently used in rats with no observable...

Scarborough, J., Mueller, F., Arban, R. et al. 2020. Preclinical validation of the micropipette-guided drug administration (MDA) method in the maternal immune activation model of neurodevelopmental disorders. Brain, Behavior, and Immunity 88, 461-470.

Pharmacological treatments in laboratory rodents remain a cornerstone of preclinical psychopharmacological research and drug development. There are numerous ways in which acute or chronic pharmacological treatments can be implemented, with each method having certain advantages...

Woodard, C. L., Nasrallah, W. B., Samiei, B. V. et al. 2020. PiDose: An open-source system for accurate and automated oral drug administration to group-housed mice. Scientific Reports 10, 11584.

Drug treatment studies in laboratory mice typically employ manual administration methods such as injection or gavage, which can be time-consuming to perform over long periods and cause substantial stress in animals. These stress responses may...

Cho, C., Michalidis, V., Lecker, I. et al. 2019. Evaluating analgesic efficacy and administration route following craniotomy in mice using the grimace scale. Scientific Reports 9, 359.

Most research laboratories abide by guidelines and mandates set by their research institution regarding the administration of analgesics to control pain during the postoperative period. Unfortunately, measuring pain originating from the head is difficult, making...

Raillard, M., Detotto, C., Grepper, S. et al. 2019. Anaesthetic and perioperative management of 14 male New Zealand white rabbits for calvarial bone surgery. Animals 9(11), 896.

Calvarial bone surgery on rabbits is frequently performed. This report aims to document a simple and practical anaesthetic and perioperative management for this procedure. Fourteen male New Zealand white rabbits were included in the study...

Dunbar, M. L., Walkowiak, K. J., Schappa Faustich, J. et al. 2019. Preliminary evaluation of sustained-release compared with conventional formulations of meloxicam in sheep (Ovis aries). JAALAS 58(3), 339-345.

Sustained-release (SR) drugs refine current analgesic regimens by alleviating the need for multiple sessions of handling and restraint and by reducing the local tissue irritation that can occur due to repeated injections. Although a variety...

Bauer, C., Schillinger, U., Brandl, J. et al. 2019. Comparison of pre-emptive butorphanol or metamizole with ketamine +medetomidine and s-ketamine + medetomidine anaesthesia in improving intraoperative analgesia in mice. Laboratory Animals 53(5), 459–469.

In accordance with the ‘refinement’ component of the 3Rs, the primary aim of this study was to investigate and compare ketamine + medetomidine (KM) and s-ketamine + medetomidine (SKM) anaesthetic protocols in C57BL/6J mice (both sexes). We sought to...

Bellini, L., De Benedictis, G. M. 2019. Effect of three opioid-based analgesic protocols on the perioperative autonomic-mediated cardiovascular response in sheep. Laboratory Animals 53(5), 491–499.

Few reports evaluate the clinical effects of opioids in sheep during experimental surgical procedures. Catecholamine-mediated haemodynamic changes resulting from surgical noxious stimulation are blunted by opioids. The aim of this study was to evaluate the...

Redaelli, V., Papa, S., Marsella, G. et al. 2019. A refinement approach in a mouse model of rehabilitation research. Analgesia strategy, reduction approach and infrared thermography in spinal cord injury. PLOS ONE 14(10), e0224337.

The principles of Refinement, Replacement and Reduction (3R’s) should be taken into account when animals must be used for scientific purpose. Here, a Reduction / Refinement approach was applied to the procedure of spinal cord...

Klune, C. B., Larkin, A. E., Leung, V. S. Y. et al. 2019. Comparing the Rat Grimace Scale and a composite behaviour score in rats. PLOS ONE 14(5), e0209467.

There is a growing interest in the use of voluntarily displayed ongoing behaviours in laboratory animals to assess the pain experience. In rats, two behavioural pain scales, the Rat Grimace Scale (RGS, a facial expression...