Recognition and Assessment

A review article on methods of clinical pain assessment in animals, including a discussion of pain alleviation techniques.

Provides a definition of pain as well as information on how pain is produced, how pain is assessed, and how pain is relieved.

This online training site provides an introduction to recognizing post-operative pain in animals. Videos, images, and text are included.

This article, originally published in the CALAS/ACSAL Newsletter Vol 30 #5 October 1996, discusses the alleviation of post-operative pain in laboratory animals as an important goal in all research.

The National Academies have developed a free online resource to help those who care for and use laboratory animals, farm animals, and pets to prevent, recognize, and alleviate pain in different types of animals, from non-human primates to fish. The web site is related to a 2009 report on the Recognition and Alleviation of Pain in Laboratory Animals.

This paper refutes claims that feeling pain is dependent on brain size and complexity. Instead, it suggests that a reasonable criteria for assessing pain-induced suffering is whether or not the animal actively seek pain relief.

A report that focuses on identifying distress and the role of humane endpoints.

The use of animals in research adheres to scientific and ethical principles that promote humane care and practice. Scientific advances in our understanding of animal physiology and behavior often require theories to be revised and standards of practice to be updated to improve laboratory animal welfare.

Changes in facial expression provide a reliable and rapid means of assessing pain in animals. NC3Rs provides training manuals, lists of references, and posters of grimace scales developed for the laboratory:

• Mouse
• Rabbit
• Rat

A review of veterinary clinical pain studies in dogs and application of computer-assisted behavioral analysis.