McEntee, D., Borg, K., Markiewicz, V. 2016. Establishment of a home-cage in vivo method of New Zealand white rabbit urine collection. Laboratory Animal Science Professional 4(4) (December), 44-46.

The most common methods for rabbit urine collection are newborn stroking, cystocentesis, and transfer to a metabolism cage.2 None of these options allow for a significant, quality amount of urine to be collected in vivo from many rabbits simultaneously while also minimizing physiological changes due to stress and fear. Additionally, of all of these methods include handling the rabbit, invasive procedures, and movement away from comfort. Minimizing or eliminating stress altogether is the ultimate goal for any rabbit procedure as they are very sensitive animals. Our method of urine collection – which is described in this paper – greatly reduces stress to the rabbit because there is no handling of the animal, the animal is not moved from its home cage, and there are no invasive procedures involved. Additionally, samples can be collected from multiple rabbits concurrently and over an unlimited period of time. Because of these attributes, the samples collected are as free as possible from physiological changes due to stress and fear in the rabbit, and they are high-quality samples free from water, food, or feces contamination.

Year
2016
Animal Type
Setting