Quality assessment of applications for animal trials

This study is the first to systematically assess the quality of research proposals for preclinical animal experiments, an issue of particular importance in light of the ongoing reproducibility crisis. We analysed 326 applications submitted to the Animal EthicsCommittee of the Medical University of Vienna, comprising a total of 1,003 individual experiments. A dedicated database was constructed containing information primarily derived from planning-stage items of the ARRIVE 2.0 guidelines. Based on these items, we developed a quality score that enables quantitative assessment of proposal quality. Descriptive analyses were performed to investigate how quality varies with factors such as animal species and research area. Our results indicate substantial room for improvement and suggest that the development of more formal guidelines—analogous to the SPIRIT guidelines for randomized clinical trial protocols—would be desirable for preclinical animal research.