THE ROLE OF ANIMAL RESEARCH IN CLINICAL MEDICINE* 
Robert Van Citters' 
INTRODUCTION 
The objectives of the papers presented in this 
book touch on many aspects of research and 
medicine. It is significant that they are target- 
oriented. They speak to the attainment of a 
practical rather than a philosophical goal. The 
topic which I shall discuss, "The Role of Animal 
Research in Clinical Medicine," is also very 
broad and it too speaks to the practical applica- 
tion of research results. 
With topic of this latitude, one is immediately 
tempted to focus remarks upon the justification 
of animal research through a detailed review of 
the past contributions to clinical medicine and 
to humanity. The fact that almost a thousand 
biomedical scientists attended the meeting ne- 
gates any need to justify its theme. All of us 
have been influenced both in our individual 
lives and in the conduct of our research careers 
by the direct application of results of animal 
research in the past. Many, if not most, of the 
great chapters in the history of medicine have 
evolved from direct application of results of 
animal research to clinical medicine. They bring 
to mind the great names in the history of medi- 
cine — Galen, Harvey, Pasteur, Leeuwenhoek, 
Koch, and Jenner — just to mention a few. It is 
worth noting in passing that the applications of 
research have been extended well beyond clinical 
medicine. Man's conquest of the air and ulti- 
mately of space was preceded by animal 
experiments. Three common farm animals made 
the first balloon ascension long before man 
ventured into the air. A broad variety of animal 
subjects pioneered in the development of high 
altitude technology before man went into the 
* This was the keynote address at the National Conference on Re- 
search Animals in Medicine. 
** Dean, School of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, 
Washington. 
stratosphere and, more recently, a whole me- 
nagerie of beasts sampled the outer atmosphere 
in advance of man's first orbital flight. I should 
also point out that each advancement in medical 
research also manifests itself in improvements 
in clinical veterinary practice. The results of 
laboratory studies have inevitably benefited 
animals as well as humans because veterinary 
practice tends to mimic clinical practice. In 
veterinary practice, antibiotics and hormones, 
dietary supplements, surgical procedures, and 
complicated diagnostic procedures that are com- 
mon today are all borrowed from clinical medi- 
cine. 
The objectives of animal research then are 
varied. Some are purely descriptive or phe- 
nomenological ; some are accomplished purely 
for the sake of research; some are applied re- 
search in the technological or veterinary sense ; 
but for the most part, researchers have studied 
the animal in order to extrapolate to man. They 
have recognized in the experimental animals an 
analog of man and have modified the animal to 
become a model of man or a model of diseased 
man. The ultimate goal has been the application 
of results obtained from animals in order to 
improve the welfare of man. The question then 
is how to improve or extend this role or how to 
facilitate the application of information derived 
from animal research to the solution of prob- 
lems of human disease. Since this question is a 
very broad one, I will only suggest a few 
answers here. 
I would like to address myself first to the 
general issue of animal models. The concept of 
animal models has become so commonplace in 
our thinking that it occupies an almost reflex 
role in the formulation of our experimental 
designs. Actually, herein lies a problem. Rigor- 
ous definition of the word "model" varies some- 
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