ABSTRACT
Service as a member of an Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) is frequently viewed by the uninitiated as something to be avoided at any price. The workload is viewed as excessive, the responsibilities are judged to be onerous, and the IACUC process is thought to be another administrative burden. In spite of that “outsider’s” view, it has been the experience of this author that once an individual with that view begins to serve on a well-functioning IACUC, they are very likely to change their opinion; they recognize that the IACUC process is essential to our ongoing use of nonhuman animal models (hereafter referred to as animal models) in research, teaching, and testing.
