Once you get added to a lab protocol, you can gain card access to the animal facility. The psychology staff member that can assist you with this process is Lana Fish. Her information is listed below:
Lana Fish
Human Resources Coordinator
lagfish@indiana.edu
office: PY 124
phone: (812)855-1695​
General rules
Always enter and exit out the right door from where you're facing. This regulates traffic flow to avoid running into others, especially if they are holding animal cages.
Do not wear lab PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) into the animal facility. Always use the PPE provided in the facility.
Do not wear the facility PPE outside of the animal facility -- throw it away before exiting. We want to minimize animal dander in the hallways.
Animal room rules
Always wear the minimum required PPE, in our case a disposable lab coat and gloves. This will minimize your exposure to animal (rat) dander to avoid developing allergies.
The animal rooms run on a daily light cycle indicated on the door of the room. It is strongly recommended that you do not enter the rooms outside of these hours.
Make sure the lid of the food bin is always closed after use. If it remains open too long, the food will have to be disposed of and replaced.
In general, the vet staff will take care of feeding and cleaning cages for our animals. There is at least one vet staff on duty every day of the year including weekends and holidays. However, we have access to clean cages and food if necessary.
Clean cages are available in one of the two tall, covered carts in the main hallway. The one closer to the entrance doors (with the "cleaner" looking cover) contains the clean cages, while dirty cages are placed in the cart located farther from the entrance doors (with the "dirty" looking cover). There are large bins located in each animal room that contains food for the animals.
In case of an emergency with one of the animals, first inform Ehren, then inform the vet as quickly as possible. Emergency numbers for the vet are listed on the entrance door to the facility. Each vet carries a pager on them 24/7 for extreme circumstances.
A special note card system has been designed for rats on food restriction. A rat on food restriction is indicated by the addition of a monthly date card with the amount indicated on the upper right corner or on the identification card. The party responsible for feeding the animal on a given day is indicated by the color of the identification card.
A white card indicates the vet staff to feed the animal. They feed the animals around noon each day, which can be problematic for rats that are being run in an experiment after that time.
A red card indicates a member of our lab is to feed the animal that day. The vet staff will not feed the animal, and it is up to the lab member overseeing that animal to feed him/her.
This system was developed so our lab has control over the feeding time on days experiments are run. Make sure the red card is showing during these periods (usually during the week). Switching to the white card on days the animals aren't run will notify the vet staff to feed them and allow the experimenter to not have to come in to lab during these periods (usually weekends or holidays).
The monthly date card must be initialed every day to indicate the rat has been fed. Vet staff may contact us if the card hasn't been initialed while the red card is present to make sure the animal is being fed. If the card isn't initialed on a day the white card was present, notify the vet staff to make sure the animal is being fed.