- Assistant Laboratory Animal Technician Animal Health and Welfare Flashcards
6 cards from real ALAT practice questions. Tap to flip, then mark Knew It or Still Learning — missed cards come back until you master them.
Read the first 6 - Assistant Laboratory Animal Technician Animal Health and Welfare flashcards as text
What are the Five Freedoms of Animal Welfare?
Answer: Freedom from hunger/thirst, discomfort, pain/injury/disease, fear/distress, and freedom to express normal behavior
The Five Freedoms provide a framework for animal welfare assessment: freedom from hunger and thirst, discomfort, pain/injury/disease, fear and distress, and freedom to express normal behavior.
What is the difference between pain and distress in laboratory animals?
Answer: Pain is a sensory response to tissue damage while distress is a broader state of suffering including anxiety, fear, and inability to adapt
Pain is a specific sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage. Distress is a broader concept encompassing negative emotional states including anxiety, fear, and the inability to adapt to environmental or procedural demands.
What welfare assessment tool uses facial expressions to evaluate pain in mice?
Answer: Mouse Grimace Scale (MGS)
The Mouse Grimace Scale evaluates five facial action units (orbital tightening, nose bulge, cheek bulge, ear position, whisker change) to provide an objective pain score.
Why is it important to provide analgesia (pain relief) after surgical procedures in laboratory animals?
Answer: To reduce suffering, improve recovery, prevent chronic pain development, and ensure valid research data unconfounded by pain-related physiological changes
Post-surgical analgesia is ethically required to reduce suffering, promotes faster recovery, prevents development of chronic pain states, and ensures research data is not confounded by stress-related physiological changes.
What is the significance of body weight monitoring as a welfare indicator?
Answer: Body weight is one of the most sensitive and objective welfare indicators, with losses often preceding visible clinical signs of illness
Body weight is one of the most sensitive welfare indicators because weight loss frequently precedes other visible clinical signs. Serial weight monitoring can detect problems days before they become clinically obvious.
What role does the ALAT play in monitoring animals on experimental protocols?
Answer: ALATs observe protocol animals during daily checks, report abnormalities to veterinary staff and investigators, and implement protocol-specific monitoring requirements
ALAT technicians are critical monitors of protocol animals during daily health observations. They report abnormalities, implement special monitoring schedules, and serve as the first line of welfare assessment for animals on experimental protocols.