Use of animals in medicine courses

Hello, some of you may remember me bothering you about whether or not animal tissues are used in medical courses. I now have info for quite a few and I thought that in case there was anyone else out there that wanted to know, then they could see here. Feel free to correct me if i'm wrong, most of this is from memory.

Oxford: yes, necessary part of the course. ferrets, guinea pigs, frogs.

Cambridge: yes, necessary part of the course. ferrets, guinea pigs, frogs

Nottingham: Optional suturing practice on pigs intestines from the butchers.

Bristol: Optional attendance to demonstrations involving display of animal tissue.

Edinburgh: Nothing

Manchester: Nothing

Newcastle: Nothing

Sheffield: Nothing

BSMS: Nothing

Leicester: Didn't 2 years ago, so I assume no still.

Leeds and Liverpool have not replied to me (although it could be because Liverpool have broken up for easter, sent the Leeds e-mail ages ago....) If anyone can provide me with any further info it would be greatly greatly appreciated.

ps. Somebody somewhere told me that if I didn't want to use animals i should re-think my career because of research projects, academic development etc. I'd just like to point out that I was recently told by a leading academic in medical research that less than 10% of all research done today uses animals while at a medisix conference. Oxbridge have no excuse, which is depressing, because otherwise I would have loved to go there.

pps. I delibrately didn't look up the london unis because I don't personally want to study there, however if anyone has info it would be nice to know, if for nothing else but perspective.

Cheers.

ppps. Thanks again to all the student room members who helped me compile this list, it has been really helpful.

Reply 1

Bilal

Are you the same person who asked about the horses? :eek:

Reply 2

Muse

lessthanthree

I don't understand why they're using guineas and frogs, unless it's simply for drug testing or manual dexterity purposes.

yeah, we used guinea pig ileum in a pharmacology experiment.

IMO medical testing using animals = essential

some teaching methods using animals = could use alternatives

Reply 3

Helenia

lessthanthree

I don't understand why they're using guineas and frogs, unless it's simply for drug testing or manual dexterity purposes.

Pigs are the best things to use, if you're trying to relate stuff to humans.

interesting list :smile:

This is for experimental purposes, not actually to practice clinical skills - it's part of the pre-clinical course to learn research techniques and how to demonstrate some principles. To extend what Michaela said:

Cambridge - Guinea pigs - hearts and ileums (ilea?) for pharmacology and digestive physiology respectively. Rabbit ileums are also sometimes used. Frog leg muscles are used for electrophysiology, as is the heart. I haven't come across anything involving ferrets. :confused:

If you go into serious research, lots more animals come into it, but we don't actually do that, just look at the results from the experiments.

Reply 4

randdom

michaela_banana

BSMS: Nothing

Not completely true. In the main course I haven't come accross it, however in one of the ssc's there were experiments on animals.

Reply 5

michaela_banana

Cheers about the BSMS and Cambridge stuff, thats quite helpful. No i'm not the chick about the horses.

If there is anyone about who does med at liverpool and can help me with this, b/c the open day is nextweek and I don't really want to go all the way up there to find out if at all possible.

Cheers again.