The University of Colorado Denver | Anschutz Medical Campus, Office of Laboratory Animal Resources and the University of Colorado Boulder, Office of Animal Resources are each responsible for the care and use of research animals in the University of Colorado system. To ensure animal health, a rodent health monitoring program is utilized to monitor the disease status of the colony from a herd health perspective. Both campuses use a variety of custom diagnostic panels for health monitoring methodologies including environmental health monitoring by exhaust dust testing (EDT), sentinel-free soiled bedding (SFSB), direct colony sampling (DCS), and rarely, but leveraged if needed, soiled bedding sentinels (SBS). A combination of these testing methods are the new industry standard in animal health monitoring to detect exposure of infection in rodent colonies. To date, both sites of the University of Colorado rely heavily on qPCR diagnostics as compared to serology or cytology.
Statewide