Moving Toward Nonanimal Approaches in Medical Research and Testing

Gail A. Van Norman is a Professor Emeritus of the Department of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine at the University of Washington in Seattle. She is an academic clinician/ethicist who has spent over 35 years in clinical practice and published a number of articles regarding the ethics and background of animal research as well as regulatory issues in pharmaceutical research and the failure of animal studies to provide effective scientific translation to human medicine. Her reviews of animal and nonanimal research published in JACC Basic to Translational Science have been among the most highly read, downloaded, and cited articles throughout the journal’s history. She has been an invited speaker at national and international meetings regarding the issues of animal research and translational science failures.

Catharine E. Krebs is a medical research specialist at the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, a United States-based organization of physicians and laypersons that promotes preventive medicine, conducts clinical research, and encourages higher standards for ethics and effectiveness in research and medical training. Her biomedical research training is in human genetics, but she has worked in animal research advocacy and policy for over four years. In her work, she advocates for the National Institutes of Health to fund and conduct the most responsible and effective biomedical practices and has authored over 20 public comments and Congressional statements for the record. She also leads an effort to address animal methods bias in publishing by developing resources for authors and by engaging with journal editors and peer reviewers. She has been an invited speaker at national and international meetings regarding research policy and advancing nonanimal research approaches.