Anesthesia and analgesia in laboratory rodents

Rodents, especially mice and rats, are by far the most common laboratory animal species and needed by virtually all fields of biomedical research. Appropriate recognition of pain and distress as well as thorough planning using safe and effective anesthetics and analgesics are essential not only for maintaining animal welfare but also for the quality of the resulting data in the study. In this chapter, recommendations are made for the selection of injectable and inhalant anesthetics, anesthetic adjuncts, methods to assess pain in rodents, and analgesics to effectively prevent and minimize pain.