Replacement, Reduction and Refinement in

animal experimentation

More Knowledge with Fewer Animals

2011: Kick-off ZonMw grant program MKMD

Program goals:

• Development of innovative 3R

methods

• Implementation of new and existing 3R methods

More Knowledge with Fewer Animals

General program conditions:

• Multi-disciplinary research

• Collaboration between relevant stakeholders

• Chain involvement

• Publication of all project results, open access, synthesis of evidence (SR)

• Implementation of results

More Knowledge with Fewer Animals

Program structure:

• Flexible, set up in modules

• Modules to be commissioned by

different parties

• First three modules have been

commissioned:

Animal-Free Research

Techniques

Amendement 21

New Module: in development

Module Animal-Free Research Techniques

Focus on Replacement

• Research projects (3.3 M€)

Cancer and other human

diseases

Public-private partnerships

Multi-disciplinary collaborations

• Follow-up ASAT2010 projects

(0.8M€)

• Implementation projects

Module Amendment 21 (2012-2014)

Focus on 3R knowledge infrastructure

• Publication of negative results

and stimulating the use of the

‘Gold Standard Publication

checklist’ (or ‘ARRIVE

guidelines’)

• Synthesis of Evidence in animal

experimentation (Systematic

Reviews)

Module Amendment 21

Publication of negative results involving animal studies Target group: ZonMw project leaders

• Additional financial support to publish negative results

• Open access

• ‘Gold Standard Publication Checklist’/ARRIVE

Aim: more awareness of the importance of publishing meaningful negative results (bias in literature, repetition of experiments)

Call open September!

Module Amendment 21

Synthesis of evidence of animal experimentation (Systematic Reviews)

Target group: researchers considering animal studies (mandatory for MKMD project leaders)

• Synthesis of evidence (SR) workshops (about six)

• Continued support for workshop participants

• Additional training for a few workshop participants

Call open on invitation March 2012

Systematic Reviews obligatory within ZonMw program: Health Care Efficiency Research (HCER)

Health Care Efficiency Research (HCER)

Actively promotes research on recognition, assessment

and implementation of cost-effective interventions and

fosters generalisation of knowledge

• Clinical research in patients

• Structural programme (1999)

Why a systematic review?

To identify knowledge gap / added value of proposed research

Systematic overview: • what’s already known on (cost-)effectiveness of intervention / implementationstrategy under study

• currently ongoing studies on similar subject

Optional: input for powercalculation (effectsize)

Quality item for reviewers

How do you judge the systematic review?

Consider:

• selection of search terms;

• all relevant databases included;

• selection of papers;

• do you miss any references relevant to this specific

proposal?

• are the conclusions of the systematic review justified?