Abstract
The Animal Welfare assessment grid (AWAG) is a cloud based online tool designed to assess and monitor the welfare and cumulative lifetime experience of animals. It has been successfully used to monitor the wellbeing of animals from an experimental, zoological, farm or pet background. No previous studies have reported the use of this method for monitoring the welfare of rodent species housed in laboratory settings. This project was designed to evaluate the applicability of AWAG in rodent species undergoing procedures commonly performed in animal research facilities. AWAG was able to capture physical, psychological, environmental and procedural parameters of rodents in genetically modified mice in different strains of mice and rats and following catheterisation and self-administration as well as following headpost surgery. Overall, AWAG scores were relatively low in our studies, even following highly invasive surgery. Transient fluctuation in AWAG scores in certain parameters were detected in response to change in housing conditions (single/group), cage cleaning, water and food restriction. The results described in this paper demonstrate that the AWAG has been successfully applied for rodent species in a laboratory setting and is effective at capturing the welfare of animals undergoing experimental procedures, including genetically modified breeding and experimental procedures, in a structured, controlled and visually represented way. This paper describes how the AWAG system has been applied to studies involving food restriction, surgery and breeding in rodents and considers how the AWAG can be used more widely and effectively in larger laboratory facilities to assist with 3Rs (reduction, refinement and replacement) strategies and further improvements in Animal Welfare practices.