Awareness and Use of Canine Quality of Life Assessment Tools in UK Veterinary Practice.

The use of formal canine quality of life (QOL) assessment tools in veterinary practice has been recommended. An online survey investigated awareness, use and barriers to use of these tools in the UK. An anonymous 24-question survey was advertised through veterinary groups and social media. Ninety veterinary surgeons and twenty veterinary nurses responded. Thirty-two respondents (29.1%) were aware of the existence of formal canine QOL assessment tools. Of the three tools listed, current use was less than four per cent. No statistically significant influence of respondent age, role (veterinary surgeon or nurse) or possession of additional qualifications was found on the awareness of QOL tools (p > 0.05). Over half of respondents (55.5%) would 'certainly' or 'probably' be willing to use a QOL assessment tool. The main barrier to use was lack of time. Other barriers included a perceived resistance from owners. Although current use and awareness of canine QOL assessment tools in UK veterinary practice is low, veterinary professionals appear willing to use the tools within their daily practice. This discrepancy implies that QOL assessment tools are not well disseminated to veterinary surgeons and nurses in practice and that various barriers inhibit their use.

Broadening the Veterinary Consultation: Dog Owners Want to Talk about More than Physical Health.

Few veterinary professionals use formal quality of life (QOL) assessment tools despite their recommendation from veterinary governing bodies to enable holistic welfare assessments and target welfare improvement strategies. Perceived barriers include resistance from owners, and this study aimed to elucidate understanding of dog owner engagement with conversations and tools relating to QOL. An online survey that investigated owner experience, comfort, and opinions about vet-client discussions on topics connected to canine health and well-being, including QOL, was completed by 410 owners. Almost all owners (95.8%) were reportedly comfortable discussing QOL, yet only 32% reported their vets had addressed it. A high proportion of owners (70.8%) expressed interest in assessment tools, but only 4.4% had experienced one, none of which were QOL tools per se. Semi-structured interviews of a sub-set of four owners provided a more in-depth examination of their experience of a health and well-being assessment tool. Thematic analysis generated three themes: 'Use of assessment tools supports client-vet relationship and empowers owners', 'Owners want to talk about holistic dog care', and 'Owner feelings on the wider application of assessment tools'. Overall, our findings suggest that owners want to broaden the veterinary consultation conversation to discuss QOL and are interested in using tools, and therefore veterinary perceptions of owner-related barriers to tool application appear unfounded. Indeed, tool uptake appears to improve the vet-client relationship and boost owner confidence.

UK government's new placement legislation is a 'good first step': a rapid qualitative analysis of consumer, business, enforcement and health stakeholder perspectives.

BACKGROUND: The current food system in England promotes a population diet that is high in fat, sugar and salt (HFSS). To address this, the UK government has implemented legislation to restrict the promotion of HFSS products in prominent locations (e.g. store entrances, checkouts) in qualifying retailers since October 2022. This study investigated the perceived impact of the legislation for affected stakeholders. METHODS: A pre-implementation rapid qualitative evaluation of stakeholder interviews. One hundred eight UK stakeholders participated in the study including 34 consumers, 24 manufacturers and retailers, 22 local authority enforcement officers and 28 academic and charitable health representatives. A participatory conference was used to enable policy recommendations to be confirmed by stakeholders. RESULTS: Stakeholders perceived the legislation to be a 'good first step' towards improving population diet but recognised this needed to be considered amongst a range of long-term obesity policies. Areas of further support were identified and these are presented as six recommendations for government to support the successful implementation of the legislation: (1) provide a free central HFSS calculator, (2) refine legislation to enhance intent and clarity, (3) conduct a robust evaluation to assess intended and unintended outcomes, (4) provide greater support for smaller businesses, (5) provide ring-fenced resources to local authorities and (6) create and communicate a long-term roadmap for food and health. CONCLUSIONS: This legislation has the potential to reduce impulse HFSS purchases and makes a solid start towards creating healthier retail outlets for consumers. Immediate government actions to create a freely accessible HFSS calculator, support smaller businesses and provide additional resources to local authorities would support successful implementation and enforcement. Independent evaluation of the implementation of the legislation will enable monitoring of potential unintended consequences identified in this study and support refinement of the legislation. A long-term roadmap is necessary to outline strategies to support equal access to healthier and sustainable food across the whole food system within the next 20-30 years.

A good life? A good death? Reconciling care and harm in animal research.

Laboratory animal science represents a challenging and controversial form of human-animal relations because its practice involves the deliberate and inadvertent harming and killing of animals. Consequently, animal research has formed the focus of intense ethical concern and regulation within the UK, in order to minimize the suffering and pain experienced by those animals whose living bodies model human diseases amongst other things. This paper draws on longitudinal ethnographic research and in-depth interviews undertaken with junior laboratory animal technicians (ATs) in UK universities between 2013 and 2015, plus insights from interviews with key stakeholders in laboratory animal welfare. In our analysis, we examine four key dimensions of care work in laboratory animal research: (i) the specific skills and sensitivities required; (ii) the role of previous experiences of animal care; (iii) the influence of institutional and affective environments and (iv) experiences of killing. We propose that different notions of care are enacted alongside, not only permitted levels of harm inflicted on research animals following research protocols, but also harms to ATs in the processes of caring and killing animals. Concluding, we argue for greater articulation of the coexistence of care and harms across debates in geography about care and human-animal relations.

Women Consumers' Views on Legislation to Restrict Prominent Placement and Multibuy Promotions of High Fat, Sugar, and Salt Products in England: A Qualitative Perspective.

BACKGROUND: As part of the childhood obesity strategy, the UK Government has introduced regulations to restrict the ways high fat salt and sugar (HFSS) products can be promoted in retail settings from October 2022. This study explored (i) consumers' views on the likely impact of the UK legislation restricting the placement and promotion of HFSS products on their shopping behaviours and (ii) consumers' beliefs about who is responsible for healthy eating. METHODS: Using a cross-sectional study design, qualitative semi-structured telephone interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of women who shopped at a discount supermarket. Thematic analysis was employed to identify key themes. RESULTS: Participants' (n = 34) had a median age of 35 years and over half were in paid employment. Five themes were identified: (1) The legislation is acceptable, but people can still (and should be able to) buy HFSS items; (2) The legislation is likely to have more impact on shoppers who do not plan their shopping; (3) Affordability of healthy food is just as, or more, important than the legislation; (4) It's up to the individual to eat healthily; and (5) Government and retailers can better support consumers to make healthy choices. CONCLUSION: Most participants were optimistic about the incoming regulations and believed that it would support consumers to make healthier food choices. Many raised concerns, however, that the high price of healthy foods and continued availability of unhealthy foods within the stores could undermine the legislation's benefits. Coupling the legislation with interventions to promote and reduce the costs of healthier products would go some way to ensure its success. Raising awareness about marketing strategies that play into consumer concerns for cost and autonomy could further increase acceptance of the policy.

Laboratory animal strain mobilities: handling with care for animal sentience and biosecurity.

The global distribution of laboratory mouse strains is valued for ensuring the continuity, validity and accessibility of model organisms. Mouse strains are therefore assumed mobile and able to travel. We draw on the concept of 'animal mobilities' (Hodgetts and Lorimer 2019) to explain how attending to laboratory mice as living animal, commodity and scientific tool is shaping how they are transported through contemporary scientific infrastructures and communities. Our paper is framed around exploring how animal strains travel, rather than animals, as we show that it is only through understanding strain mobility that we can explain how and why live animal movement can be replaced by germinal products. The research is based on qualitative fieldwork in 2018 and 2019 that included 2 weeks ethnography and interviews with key informants involved in the movement of laboratory animals. The empirical analysis discusses practices that relate to managing biosecurity and animal welfare concerns when moving laboratory animal strains. In closing we reflect more broadly on the contemporary 'ethico-onto-epistemological' (Barad, 2014) entanglement that shapes who or what travels to support laboratory science data-making practices, and the intensity of care 'tinkering' practices (Mol and Law 2010) that facilitate the movement. We explain how a laboratory animal strain exceeds its value solely as a mobile and thus exchangeable commodity, illustrated in how values that relate to animal sentience and infection-risk supports its material transformation. Consequently, it is becoming increasingly common for non-sentient germinal products - embryos and gametes - to replace live sentient animals when being moved.

A semi-structured questionnaire survey of laboratory animal rehoming practice across 41 UK animal research facilities.

If a laboratory animal survives an experiment without lasting compromised welfare, its future must be negotiated. Rehoming may be a consideration. This paper reports on research findings that provide an indication of the uptake of animal rehoming by UK facilities and the associated moral, ethical, practical and regulatory considerations that inform decisions to rehome or not. This research addresses a widely acknowledged gap in the literature to understand both the numbers, and types of animals rehomed from UK research facilities, as well as the main motivations for engaging in the practice, and the barriers for those facilities not currently rehoming. From the ~160 UK research facilities in the UK, 41 facilities completed the questionnaire, giving a response rate of approximately 25%. Results suggest rehoming occurs routinely, yet the numbers are small; just 2322 animals are known to have been rehomed between 2015-2017. At least 1 in 10 facilities are rehoming. There exists a clear preference for the rehoming of some species (mainly cats, dogs and horses) over others (rodents, agricultural animals and primates). Indeed, although 94.15% of species kept in laboratories are rodents, they make up under a fifth (19.14%) of all animals known to be rehomed between 2015-2017. The primary motivation for rehoming is to boost staff morale and promote a positive ethical profile for the facility. Barriers include concern for the animal's welfare following rehoming, high scientific demand for animals that leaves few to be rehomed, and, finally, certain animals (mainly those genetically modified) are simply unsuited to rehoming. The findings of this research will support facilities choosing to rehome, as well as those that are not currently engaging in the practice. By promoting the practice, the benefits to rehoming in terms of improving laboratory animal's quality of life, helping facility staff to overcome the moral stress of killing, and addressing public concern regarding the fate of laboratory animals, can be attained. It is only once an understanding of rehoming from the perspective of UK research facilities has been ascertained, that appropriate policy and support can be provided.

Animal research nexus: a new approach to the connections between science, health and animal welfare.

Animals used in biological research and testing have become integrated into the trajectories of modern biomedicine, generating increased expectations for and connections between human and animal health. Animal research also remains controversial and its acceptability is contingent on a complex network of relations and assurances across science and society, which are both formally constituted through law and informal or assumed. In this paper, we propose these entanglements can be studied through an approach that understands animal research as a nexus spanning the domains of science, health and animal welfare. We introduce this argument through, first, outlining some key challenges in UK debates around animal research, and second, reviewing the way nexus concepts have been used to connect issues in environmental research. Third, we explore how existing social sciences and humanities scholarship on animal research tends to focus on different aspects of the connections between scientific research, human health and animal welfare, which we suggest can be combined in a nexus approach. In the fourth section, we introduce our collaborative research on the animal research nexus, indicating how this approach can be used to study the history, governance and changing sensibilities around UK laboratory animal research. We suggest the attention to complex connections in nexus approaches can be enriched through conversations with the social sciences and medical humanities in ways that deepen appreciation of the importance of path-dependency and contingency, inclusion and exclusion in governance and the affective dimension to research. In conclusion, we reflect on the value of nexus thinking for developing research that is interdisciplinary, interactive and reflexive in understanding how accounts of the histories and current relations of animal research have significant implications for how scientific practices, policy debates and broad social contracts around animal research are being remade today.

To change or not to change? Veterinarian and farmer perceptions of relational factors influencing the enactment of veterinary advice on dairy farms in the United Kingdom.

Achieving herd health and welfare improvement increasingly relies on cattle veterinarians to train and advise farmers, placing veterinary interactions at the heart of knowledge exchange. Cattle veterinarians recognize their influence and the need to be proactive advisors but struggle with acting upon this awareness in daily practice, reporting a need to enhance their advisory approach to inspire farmer behavior change. Understanding how veterinarian-farmer interactions positively or negatively influence the enactment of change on farm is therefore essential to support the cattle veterinary profession. This paper adopts a qualitative approach to conceptualize how and under what circumstances veterinary advice has the potential to support and inspire farmer engagement with behavior change on the UK dairy farm. Fourteen UK dairy farms were recruited to take part in a qualitative study involving research observation of a typical advisory consultation between veterinarian and farmer (n = 14) followed by separate, in-depth interviews with the farmer(s) and their respective veterinarian. Interview data were organized using a template coding method and analyzed thematically. While accuracy of veterinary advisory content was valued, it was a relational context of trust, shared veterinarian-farmer understanding, and meaningful interpretation of advice at a local (farmer) level that was most likely to enact change. Critically, these relational factors were reported to work together synergistically; a trusting relationship was an essential, but not necessarily sufficient, component to create a culture of change. Findings suggest that cattle veterinarians may benefit from tailoring advisory services to the farmer's specific world view, facilitated by a shared understanding of the farmer's immediate and long-term motivational drivers. In consequence, cattle veterinarians seeking to positively engage farmers in advisory interactions could consider a focus on farmer priorities, motivations, and goals as paramount to frame and inform advisory messages. This explicit collaborative communication encourages the selection of appropriate and timely veterinary expertise, leading to better integration and adoption of advice on farm given enhanced advisory relevance for farmers' unique circumstances. This farmer-centered approach, involving active co-creation of plans between individuals, is critical for engagement and commitment when tackling complex problems.

Attuning to laboratory animals and telling stories: Learning animal geography research skills from animal technologists.

Posthumanism has challenged the social sciences and humanities to rethink anthopocentricism within the cultures and societies they study and to take account of more-than-human agencies and perspectives. This poses key methodological challenges, including a tendency for animal geographies to focus very much on the human side of human-animal relations and to fail to acknowledge animals as embodied, lively, articulate political subjects. In this paper, we draw on recent ethnographic work, observing and participating in the care of research animals and interviewing the animal technologists, to contribute to the understandings of life within the animal house. In so doing, the paper makes three key arguments. Firstly, that studying how animal technologists perform everyday care and make sense of their relationships with animals offers useful insights into the specific skills, expertise and relationships required in order to study human-animal relations. Secondly, that animal technologists are keenly aware of the contested moralities which emerge in animal research environments and can offer an important position from which to understand this. Thirdly, that storytelling (exemplified by the stories told by animal technologists) is a useful resource for animal geographers to engage with complexity in human-animal relations.

Exploring the Role of Animal Technologists in Implementing the 3Rs: An Ethnographic Investigation of the UK University Sector.

The biomedical industry relies on the skills of animal technologists (ATs) to put laboratory animal welfare into practice. This is the first study to explore how this is achieved in relation to their participation in implementing refinement and reduction, two of the three key guiding ethical principles--the "3Rs"--of what is deemed to be humane animal experimentation. The interpretative approach contributes to emerging work within the social sciences and humanities exploring care and ethics in practice. Based on qualitative analysis of participant observation within animal research facilities in UK universities, in-depth interviews with ATs, facility managers, and other stakeholders, and analysis of regulatory guidelines, we draw a contrast between the minimum required of ATs by law and how their care work not only meets but often exceeds these requirements. We outline how ATs constitute a key source of innovation and insight into the refinement of animal care and the reduction of animal use, hitherto not formally acknowledged. Exploring AT care work as an example of ethics in practice makes an original contribution to broader debates within health care and animal welfare about how technology, regulation, and behavior can foster and sustain a "culture of care".

The future of veterinary communication: Partnership or persuasion? A qualitative investigation of veterinary communication in the pursuit of client behaviour change.

Client behaviour change is at the heart of veterinary practice, where promoting animal health and welfare is often synonymous with engaging clients in animal management practices. In the medical realm, extensive research points to the link between practitioner communication and patient behavioural outcomes, suggesting that the veterinary industry could benefit from a deeper understanding of veterinarian communication and its effects on client motivation. Whilst extensive studies have quantified language components typical of the veterinary consultation, the literature is lacking in-depth qualitative analysis in this context. The objective of this study was to address this deficit, and offer new critical insight into veterinary communication strategies in the pursuit of client behaviour change. Role-play interactions (n = 15) between UK cattle veterinarians and an actress experienced in medical and veterinary education were recorded, transcribed and analysed thematically. Analysis revealed that, overall, veterinarians tend to communicate in a directive style (minimal eliciting of client opinion, dominating the consultation agenda, prioritising instrumental support), reflecting a paternalistic role in the consultation interaction. Given this finding, recommendations for progress in the veterinary industry are made; namely, the integration of evidence-based medical communication methodologies into clinical training. Use of these types of methodologies may facilitate the adoption of more mutualistic, relationship-centred communication in veterinary practice, supporting core psychological elements of client motivation and resultant behaviour change.

Developing a Collaborative Agenda for Humanities and Social Scientific Research on Laboratory Animal Science and Welfare.

Improving laboratory animal science and welfare requires both new scientific research and insights from research in the humanities and social sciences. Whilst scientific research provides evidence to replace, reduce and refine procedures involving laboratory animals (the '3Rs'), work in the humanities and social sciences can help understand the social, economic and cultural processes that enhance or impede humane ways of knowing and working with laboratory animals. However, communication across these disciplinary perspectives is currently limited, and they design research programmes, generate results, engage users, and seek to influence policy in different ways. To facilitate dialogue and future research at this interface, we convened an interdisciplinary group of 45 life scientists, social scientists, humanities scholars, non-governmental organisations and policy-makers to generate a collaborative research agenda. This drew on methods employed by other agenda-setting exercises in science policy, using a collaborative and deliberative approach for the identification of research priorities. Participants were recruited from across the community, invited to submit research questions and vote on their priorities. They then met at an interactive workshop in the UK, discussed all 136 questions submitted, and collectively defined the 30 most important issues for the group. The output is a collaborative future agenda for research in the humanities and social sciences on laboratory animal science and welfare. The questions indicate a demand for new research in the humanities and social sciences to inform emerging discussions and priorities on the governance and practice of laboratory animal research, including on issues around: international harmonisation, openness and public engagement, 'cultures of care', harm-benefit analysis and the future of the 3Rs. The process outlined below underlines the value of interdisciplinary exchange for improving communication across different research cultures and identifies ways of enhancing the effectiveness of future research at the interface between the humanities, social sciences, science and science policy.

Becoming ecological citizens: connecting people through performance art, food matter and practices.

Engaging the interest of Western citizens in the complex food connections that shape theirs' and others' personal wellbeing around issues such as food security and access is challenging. This article is critical of the food marketplace as the site for informing consumer behaviour and argues instead for arts-based participatory activities to support the performance of ecological citizens in non-commercial spaces. Following the ongoing methodological and conceptual fascination with performance, matter and practice in cultural food studies, we outline what the ecological citizen, formed through food's agentive potential, does and could do. This is an ecological citizen, defined not in its traditional relation to the state but rather to the world of humans and non-humans whose lives are materially interconnected through nourishment. The article draws on the theories of Berlant, Latour, Bennett and Massumi. Our methodology is a collaborative arts-led research project that explored and juxtaposed diverse food practices with artist Paul Hurley, researchers, community partners, volunteers and participants in Bristol, UK. It centred on a 10-day exhibition where visitors were exposed to a series of interactive explorations with and about food. Our experience leads us to outline two steps for enacting ecological citizenship. The first step is to facilitate sensory experiences that enable the agential qualities of foodstuffs to shape knowledge making. The second is to create a space where people can perform, or relate differently, in unusual manners to food. Through participating in the project and visiting the exhibition, people were invited to respond not only as 'ethical consumers' but also as 'ecological citizens'. This participatory approach to research can contribute to understandings of human-world entanglements.

Scaffold-hopping with zwitterionic CCR3 antagonists: identification and optimisation of a series with good potency and pharmacokinetics leading to the discovery of AZ12436092.

The discovery and optimisation of a series of zwitterionic CCR3 antagonists is described. Optimisation of the structure led to AZ12436092, a compound with excellent selectivity over activity at hERG and outstanding pharmacokinetics in preclinical species.