Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jul 12, 2025
Traumatic Peripheral Nerve Injury in Mice
Published on: March 25, 2022
Animal models in peripheral nerve transection studies: a systematic review on study design and outcomes assessment
Bruna Lopes1,2,3, André Coelho1,2,3, Rui Alvites1,2,3,4
1Centro de Estudos de Ciência Animal (CECA), Instituto de Ciências, Tecnologias e Agroambiente da Universidade do Porto (ICETA), Rua D. Manuel II, Apartado 55142, Porto, 4051-401, Portugal.
None:
Aim: Peripheral nerve injury regeneration studies using animal models are crucial to different pre-clinical therapeutic approaches efficacy evaluation whatever the surgical technique explored. Materials & methods: A 944 articles systematic review on 'peripheral nerve injury in animal models' over the last 9 years was carried out. Results: It was found that 91% used rodents, and only 9% employed large animals. Different nerves are studied, with generated gaps (10,78 mm) and methods applied for regeneration evaluation uniformed. Sciatic nerve was the most used (88%), followed by median and facial nerves (2.6%), significantly different. Conclusion: There has not been a significant scale-up of the in vivo testing to large animal models (anatomically/physiologically closer to humans), allowing an improvement in translational medicine for clinical cases.
