Mouse handling

Many of you may already know that I have an intense fear of dogs, although it has gotten a wee bit better this year after knowing friends who are passionate dog lovers. I do find these hairy fluffy animals adorable and I hope I would fight and overcome this silly phobia one day. Dear Lord please help.

While we're on the topic of animals, I thought I'd share with you one of the most important parts of medical research, that is, experimental animals. They are something medical researchers often use to test drugs on for potential treatments before they go into clinical trials, study human diseases, and various other medical conditions such as arthritis, cancer, and arthrosclerosis among others. So to give you a peek into how the mice in our lab are manipulated, I've taken photos during the time where I had to cull 16 mice for a particular experiment. Please note that all the procedures are ethically approved. If you are going to chuck a fit then I'd suggest you refrain from viewing the photos :)

This is how the mice are caged. Maximum of 5 in a box of this size. There are different colour coats, depending on the type of mice.

These little creatures don't normally bite unless threatened or aggravated.

The grey box is where we place the mice as we gas them with carbon dioxide.

An alternative way is to use the guillotine. We don't use it though. It was just... there on the bench. Eww!

This is how they look after gassing them with carbon dioxide.

Depending on your experiment, sometimes, blood samples are collected. This method is termed cardiac puncture, where the blood is collected by inserting the needle under the xyphoid cartilage slightly to the left of midline. The needle is advanced at a 20 to 30 degree angle from the horizontal axis to the sternum to enter the heart.

Organ samples are then collected for further experiments in vitro.

Well, now you have an idea of how animal work is like. It's not fun, but it helps cure sickness and diseases and subsequently prolong our lives. Essentially, our lives are still in God's hands and it is only by His grace that we are alive and well :)