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. 
Digranes, N., Haga, H. A., Nordgreen, J. 2023. High and hyper: Fentanyl induces psychomotor side-effects in healthy pigs. Animals 13(10), 1671.

Analgesic effects of fentanyl have been investigated using behavior. The behavioral effects of fentanyl and possible serotonergic influence are largely unknown. We therefore investigated behavioral effects of fentanyl, with or without the serotonin antagonist ketanserin...

Morton, D. B. 2023. A model framework for the estimation of animal “suffering”: Its use in predicting and retrospectively assessing the impact of experiments on animals. Animals 13(5), 800.

This paper presents and illustrates, with a working example, a hypothesis for the assessment of ongoing severity before and during an experiment that will enable humane endpoints and intervention points to be applied accurately and...

Attokaren, M. K., Jeong, N., Blanpain, L. et al. 2023. BrainWAVE: A flexible method for noninvasive stimulation of brain rhythms across species. ENeuro 10(2) ENEURO.0257-22.2022.

Rhythmic neural activity, which coordinates brain regions and neurons to achieve multiple brain functions, is impaired in many diseases. Despite the therapeutic potential of driving brain rhythms, methods to noninvasively target deep brain regions are...

Costa, G. L., Spadola, F., Di Pietro, S. et al. 2023. Tramadol vs. Lidocaine administered intraperitoneally and in incisional lines for the intraoperative and postoperative pain management of romifidine-telazol-anesthetized swine undergoing umbilical hernia repair. Animals 13(18), 2905.

The aim of the study was to compare the analgesic efficacy of tramadol and lidocaine for local anesthesia during umbilical hernia repair in swine. The study was performed on 66 large white crossbred swine. The...

Paterson, E. A., Turner, P. V. 2022. Challenges with assessing and treating pain in research primates: A focused survey and literature review. Animals 12(17), 2304.

Research primates may undergo surgical procedures making effective pain management essential to ensure good animal welfare and unbiased scientific data. Adequate pain mitigation is dependent on whether veterinarians, technicians, researchers, and caregivers can recognize and...

Windsor, P. A. 2022. Role of topical anaesthesia in pain management of farm animals, a changing paradigm. Animals 12(18), 2459.

Field evidence indicates that livestock producers are motivated by access to products that readily deliver pain management during husbandry interventions and, more recently, viral epidermal infectious diseases, including FMD. There has been impressive adoption in...

Williams, W. O., Baneux, P. 2022. Humane Intervention Points: Refining endpoint terminology to incorporate non-euthanasia intervention options to improve animal welfare and preserve experimental outcomes. Laboratory Animals 56(5), 482-489.

Consideration of The Three R’s (Replacement, Reduction, and Refinement) is essential when setting Humane Endpoints; however, a common interpretation assumes that Humane Endpoints are timepoints to perform euthanasia. This interpretation is not always consistent with...

Steagall, P. V., Bustamante, H., Johnson, C. B. et al. 2021. Pain management in farm animals: Focus on cattle, sheep and pigs. Animals 11(6), 1483.

Pain causes behavioral, autonomic, and neuroendocrine changes and is a common cause of animal welfare compromise in farm animals. Current societal and ethical concerns demand better agricultural practices and improved welfare for food animals. These...

Nunamaker, E. A., Davis, S., O’Malley, C. I. et al. 2021. Developing recommendations for cumulative endpoints and lifetime use for research animals. Animals 11(7), 2031.

Research animals are important for scientific advancement, and therefore, their long-term welfare needs to be monitored to not only minimize suffering, but to provide positive affective states and experiences. Currently, there is limited guidance in...

Ellis, T., Katsiadaki, I. 2021. Clarification of early end-points for refinement of animal experiments, with specific reference to fish. Laboratory Animals 55(3), 244-253.

Appropriate end-points are integral to the refinement of laboratory animal experiments. Our recent experience has highlighted that ambiguity around end-points is hampering their adoption in experiments that cause severe suffering to fish. In toxicology, the...

Burkemper, M. C., Pairis-Garcia, M. D., Moraes, L. E. et al. 2020. Effects of oral meloxicam and topical lidocaine on pain associated behaviors of piglets undergoing surgical castration. Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science 23(2), 209-218.

The objective of this study was to find a practical means of reducing pain associated with surgical castration by evaluating the effects of oral meloxicam and topical lidocaine, separately and in combination, on behavioral indicators...

Larson, C. M., Wilcox, G. L., Fairbanks, C. A. 2019. Defining and managing pain in stroke and traumatic brain injury research. Comparative Medicine 69(6), 510–519.

Neurologic conditions such as stroke and traumatic brain injury are challenging conditions to study in humans. Animal models are necessary to uncover disease processes and develop novel therapies. When attempting to model these or other...

Clutton, R. E. 2020. An Anglocentric history of anaesthetics and analgesics in the refinement of animal experiments. Animals 10(10), 1933.

Previous histories of animal experimentation, e.g., Franco (2013) have focused on ethics, the law and the personalities involved, but not on the involvement of anaesthetics or analgesics. Given that these were major subjects of (UK)...

Morrison, R., Hemsworth, P. 2020. Tail docking of piglets 2: Effects of meloxicam on the stress response to tail docking. Animals 10(9), 1699.

This experiment compared the stress responses of piglets to tail docking. Two hundred and eighty-eight piglets were allocated to the following treatments at 2 d post-farrowing: (1) sham handling treatment; (2) surgical castration; (3) tail...

Reynolds, K., Johnson, R., Brown, J. et al. 2020. Assessing pain control efficacy of meloxicam and ketoprofen when compounded with iron dextran in nursing piglets using a navigation chute. Animals 10(7), 1237.

The efficacy of analgesics such as meloxicam and ketoprofen to control pain in piglets when mixed with iron dextran (ID) before injection is unknown. The purpose of this study was to compare perceived pain in...

Sheil, M., Polkinghorne, A. 2020. Optimal methods of documenting analgesic efficacy in neonatal piglets undergoing castration. Animals 10(9), 1450.

Analgesic products for piglet castration are critically needed. This requires extensive animal experimentation such as to meet regulatory-required proof of efficacy. At present, there are no validated methods of assessing pain in neonatal piglets. This...

Viscardi, A. V., Turner, P. V. 2019. Use of meloxicam, buprenorphine, and Maxilene® to assess a multimodal approach for piglet pain management, part 1: surgical castration. Animal Welfare 28(4), 487-498.

Surgical castration of piglets is a routine procedure on commercial pig farms, to prevent boar taint and reduce aggression. This procedure is known to cause pain, yet piglets are often not provided appropriate analgesia for...

Viscardi, A. V., Turner, P. V. 2019. Use of meloxicam, buprenorphine, and Maxilene® to assess a multimodal approach for piglet pain management, part 2: tail-docking. Animal Welfare 28(4), 499-510.

Piglets on commercial pig farms are often tail-docked to reduce the incidence of tail-biting. While this is a painful procedure, piglets are often not provided analgesia or anaesthesia for pain relief. The objectives of this...

Chatigny, F. 2019. The controversy on fish pain: A veterinarian’s perspective. Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science 22(4), 400-410.

Fish welfare is still a relatively new field. As such, regulations and protocols to ensure fish welfare are currently limited and vary considerably in different jurisdictions. This is in part because of the ongoing controversy...

Sloman, K, A., Bouyoucos, I. A., Brooks, E. J. et al. 2019. Ethical considerations in fish research. Journal of Fish Biology 94(4), 556-577.

In this review, we focus primarily on the refinement of common methods used in fish research based on emerging knowledge with the aim of improving the welfare of fish used in scientific studies. We consider...

Musk, G. C., Kershaw, H., He, B. 2019. Multiple refinements to the anaesthetic protocol for laparoscopic orthotopic kidney auto-transplantation in a pig model. Laboratory Animals 53(1), 72–78.

Fifty-four pigs (Sus scrofa, Large White cross) from a commercial pig farm were anaesthetised over a six-year period from October 2011. The procedural stages included initial instrumentation for intra-operative monitoring, laparoscopic nephrectomy, preparation of the...

Schoos, A., Devreese, M., Maes, D. G. 2019. Use of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs in porcine health management. Veterinary Record 185(6), 172.

Objective: Treatment of inflammation and pain management is an important topic in the welfare of pigs. It is very difficult for veterinary practitioners to choose the most appropriate product for a certain problem. This review...

Deurinck, M., Schindler, S., Bugnon, P. et al. 2018. Report from the 2017 Annual SGV (Swiss Laboratory Animal Science Association ) Meeting. Laboratory Animals 52(2), 211-213. [Meeting Report]

The Scientific Committee of the Swiss Laboratory Animal Science Association (Schweizerische Gesellschaft für Versuchstierkunde, SGV) reports on the Annual SGV Meeting held on 28 and 29 November 2017, at Technopark, Zürich, Switzerland. Feedback after the...

Fox, L., Mans, C. 2018. Analgesic efficacy and safety of buprenorphine in chinchillas (Chinchilla lanigera). JAALAS 57(3), 286-290.

Buprenorphine is routinely used in chinchillas at reported doses of 0.01 to 0.1 mg/kg IM or SC. However, these dose recommendations are based on anecdotal reports or extrapolation from studies in other species. Therefore, the...

Evenson, E. A., Mans, C. 2018. Analgesic efficacy and safety of hydromorphone in chinchillas (Chinchilla lanigera). JAALAS 57(3), 282-285.

Limited information is available regarding the efficacy of opioid analgesics in chinchillas. Here we sought to evaluate the analgesic efficacy and safety of hydromorphone in chinchillas. In a randomized, controlled, blind, complete crossover design, hydromorphone...