Proactive compliance-the team program approach to revitalizing primate enrichment.

The Division of Laboratory Animal Resources (DLAR) at the University of Pittsburgh proactively instituted a nonhuman enrichment plan that is founded on the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Final Report on the Environmental Enhancement to Promote the Psychological Well-being of Nonhuman Primates (July 1999). This document is a draft policy of the USDA that has not yet been enacted. In anticipation of the these standards becoming policy, the DLAR, and our Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC), primate user groups, and Enrichment Specialist compared these new standards to our previous IACUC-approved plan. Our goal was to be "proactively compliant" to anticipated policy changes described in The Final Report. We established a program that was consistent with the five "critical" elements of The Final Report and our goal to have a revitalized enrichment plan that applied internal evaluation for continued improvement. A task force was implemented to review current literature and regulations on enrichment. Then a subcommittee consisting of veterinarians, investigators whose research would be affected by the anticipated policy changes, and IACUC members was formed. They established criteria for dispensation from plan elements, brought current protocols into compliance, shared enrichment and documentation techniques, and considered research methods in decision-making. In addition, a primate Enrichment Specialist position was developed and recruited. The Enrichment Specialist worked with investigators to evaluate enrichment and documentation needs and organized and implemented plan structure. The DLAR staff provided animal care and veterinary insight and reported to the IACUC. Investigators discussed how research and enrichment affected each other. The IACUC considered these issues before approving the plan. Our revitalized plan is running smoothly. The Enrichment Specialist oversees plan implementation and documentation. The DLAR assists enrichment and animal assessment. Investigators assist with assessment, provide enhanced enrichment, and document their progress. The IACUC addresses dispensation requests through designated review on the large-animal subcommittee.