Behind the Curve of Medical Education: The Use of Dogs for Physiology Instruction at New York Medical College
A Report by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine
John J. Pippin, M.D., F.A.C.C.
September 5, 2007
Appendix B
Comments from Education Professionals and Physicians (Including NYMC Graduates) on the
Use of Live Animals for Medical School Education
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In response to a 2006 survey regarding the experiences of medical schools that had eliminated animal labs, Cornell’s Weill Medical College (ranked #15 among U.S. medical schools) stated that the discontinued use of animals has had no adverse effect on medical student education. Here is what was written on the bottom of the survey: “This change was made more than 10 years ago; students and faculty have adjusted. Student performance outcomes remain excellent.”
Also in response to that survey, a curriculum administrator at the University of Pennsylvania (ranked #3 among U.S. medical schools) stated: “Our curriculum is very successful, providing our students with a strong foundation without using animals.” Martin Eason, M.D., director of the Patient Simulation Laboratory at East Tennessee State University Quillen School of Medicine, stated in April 2006: “These tools are so much better than using animals that no schools should be depriving their students of them.” Adam Levine, M.D., director of the Simulation Center at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, stated in December 2005: “I am a strong opponent of the use of animals for education and say so openly. As a medical student at Mount Sinai from 1985-1989, I myself refused to participate in the dog lab component of the physiology curriculum. The three simulator labs that I created and conduct are mandatory and were created and conducted as alternatives to the elective pig lab.” -
An e-mail from the curriculum office of a New York medical school stated: “After an extensive nationwide survey of medical schools we determined that virtually every school in the U.S. had abandoned those experiences, instead opting to use human simulators or standardized patient exercises to teach fundamental physiological principles to pre-clerkship students. Only three of 126 schools [sic] still use some form of live animal experimentation. Most of the schools that we interviewed had determined that the educational value was limited and did not warrant the tremendous investment of resources.”
Philip Padrid, D.V.M., and associate professor of medicine at the University of Chicago Pritzger School of Medicine, wrote in a letter dated Dec. 26, 2000: “Until 1996 I participated as a faculty member in the demonstration of general cardiovascular physiology principles to 1st and 2nd year medical school students at the Pritzger School of Medicine. Live dogs were anesthetized, instrumented etc (you know the drill), and sacrificed at the end of the lab. In 1996 one of my colleagues wrote and instituted into the course a computer simulation program to mimic the various principles that were previously demonstrated using dogs. The students were required to participate in the live dog lab and the computer simulation, at the end of the course the students were required to evaluate both approaches. By a clear majority, the students felt the computer simulation was superior in all important didactic categories. As a direct result of their input we stopped using live animals in this laboratory, and the computer simulation is now routinely and exclusively used in this lab. Kathleen Norman, M.D., a 1990 graduate of New York Medical College, recently stated: “I refused to practice on live animals when I was in medical school. This had no adverse impact whatsoever on my medical education nor my practice at any time. In January 2007, anesthesiologist and pain management physician Daran Haber, M.D., stated: “There are absolutely better methods available than using animals for medical education. As a medical student in the 1980s live animals were not part of my education. There is no part of my medical practice as an anesthesiologist which is dependent upon or was improved by animal-based teaching. Margaret E. Stevens, M.D., a 1954 graduate of NYMC, recently stated: “As an alumnus of New York Medical College and retired pediatrician I can safely say that using live animals to teach human physiology is an inferior and inhumane practice. I hope NYMC will join schools like Columbia, Yale, and Stanford in doing away with its live animal lab. It would make me very proud.
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