Validating alternative models to cats and dogs for heartworm drug testing

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Heartworm is a parasitic worm disease in cats and dogs in many areas of the world. More infections are being identified in Northern Europe and cases have been identified in the UK. Left untreated, heartworm is potentially lethal. Current drugs used to prevent heartworm from infecting the heart are not working as well because of the development of drug resistant parasites. Drugs used to treat heartworms cause side effects which can be lethal. New heartworm drugs are being developed by animal healthcare companies. Currently, we don't have any alternative way of testing new drugs other than to experiment on cats or dogs. Sometimes cats or dogs will become very ill as a result of being infected with heartworm for the purposes of testing drugs.In this project we will develop cell culture and mouse alternatives to cats and dogs to support the early larval growth of heartworm. We will select the best cultures and mouse strain and check to see whether two different types of drug can give the expected effects in these new models.When we get to this point in the project we will advocate the adoption of these alternatives to a range of important potential end-users including testing laboratories and animal health care companies.We calculate that these alternative models will reduce overall numbers of animals used in heartworm drug testing. We also estimate that using mice instead of cats or dogs in drug testing will refine testing by avoiding long duration infections that can induce severe pain and suffering.