title: Expectations for methodology and translation of animal research: a survey of health care workers.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Health care workers (HCW) often perform, promote, and advocate use of public funds for animal research (AR); therefore, an awareness of the empirical costs and benefits of animal research is an important issue for HCW. We aim to determine what health-care-workers consider should be acceptable standards of AR methodology and translation rate to humans.
  
  
  METHODS
  After development and validation, an e-mail survey was sent to all pediatricians and pediatric intensive care unit nurses and respiratory-therapists (RTs) affiliated with a Canadian University. We presented questions about demographics, methodology of AR, and expectations from AR. Responses of pediatricians and nurses/RTs were compared using Chi-square, with P < .05 considered significant.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Response rate was 44/114(39%) (pediatricians), and 69/120 (58%) (nurses/RTs). Asked about methodological quality, most respondents expect that: AR is done to high quality; costs and difficulty are not acceptable justifications for low quality; findings should be reproducible between laboratories and strains of the same species; and guidelines for AR funded with public money should be consistent with these expectations. Asked about benefits of AR, most thought that there are sometimes/often large benefits to humans from AR, and disagreed that "AR rarely produces benefit to humans." Asked about expectations of translation to humans (of toxicity, carcinogenicity, teratogenicity, and treatment findings), most: expect translation >40% of the time; thought that misleading AR results should occur <21% of the time; and that if translation was to occur <20% of the time, they would be less supportive of AR. There were few differences between pediatricians and nurses/RTs.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  HCW have high expectations for the methodological quality of, and the translation rate to humans of findings from AR. These expectations are higher than the empirical data show having been achieved. Unless these areas of AR significantly improve, HCW support of AR may be tenuous.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, University of Alberta, Edmonton Clinic Health Academy, 4-546 11405 87 Ave, Edmonton, AB, Canada. ari.joffe@albertahealthservices.ca.|John Dossetor Health Ethics Center, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada. ari.joffe@albertahealthservices.ca.
authors.forename: Ari R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Joffe
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada. mj_bara@hotmail.com.
authors.forename: Meredith
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bara
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, University of Alberta, Edmonton Clinic Health Academy, 4-546 11405 87 Ave, Edmonton, AB, Canada. Natalie.anton@albertahealthservices.ca.
authors.forename: Natalie
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Anton
authors.affiliation: Department of Philosophy, Morehouse College, Atlanta, GA, USA. Nathan.nobis@gmail.com.|Community Health & Preventive Medicine, Morehouse School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA, USA. Nathan.nobis@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Nathan
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Nobis
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D032761:Animal Experimentation / Q000592:standards; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D002170:Canada; D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009726:Nurses; D010372:Pediatrics; D010820:Physicians; D012107:Research Design / Q000592:standards; D012138:Respiratory Therapy; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D057170:Translational Research, Biomedical; D055815:Young Adult