Following years of criticism, the Brown emergency medicine residency program is no longer using live animals to train its residents. Previously, the program had intubated live pigs for emergency physician training.
The live animal procedural skills program was paused by Brown University Health and the emergency medicine residency program in April 2025 following a “regular review process,” BUH spokesperson Kelly Brennan wrote in an email to The Herald.
“All educational programs are evaluated to ensure they align with our training objectives, ethical standards and institutional priorities,” she added.
According to Ryan Merkley, director of research advocacy at the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, there was one specific surgical procedure practiced on anesthetized pigs by trainees in Brown’s program.
“They would make incisions in the pigs’ necks in order to place a tube in their airway,” Merkley explained. Multiple trainees would practice the procedure, and the pigs would eventually be killed, he added.
According to a PCRM report, Brown was one of only nine programs — and the only Ivy League institution — in the United States and Canada that still used live animals in training.
“To have Brown on the right side of this is really important,” Merkley said. “I think we’ll send a message, especially when you can now say every Ivy League emergency medicine residency program has replaced animals,” Merkley said.
In 2023, a bill was introduced in the state House of Representatives to prohibit the use of live animals in training. At the time, a rally was held outside the Rhode Island State House to support the bill, The Herald previously reported. The bill did not make it through committee and was held for further study.
Daniel Shanin, medical director of the Anderson Emergency Center at Rhode Island Hospital, wrote in an email to The Herald that animal models allow for a “high-fidelity way to prepare our physicians.”
“It is in the best interest of everybody in our community … to have a medical team trained, competent and prepared to do whatever it takes to save your life,” he wrote.
According to Shanin, animal models are not the only method used for training, but procedures “are also not always readily duplicated via alternative means.”
“Clear human benefit is what must be weighed against a matching desire to protect and respect animals,” he added.
Merkley characterized the decision as long overdue.
“Brown is finally catching up to its peers,” Merkley said. “There’s so much support for replacing animals in medical training that most medical training programs don’t even think about it as an issue.”
In medical institutes today, non-animal methods, such as medical simulators and 3D-printed airways, are the standard, he added.
“We’re very excited that Brown is finally changing,” Merkley said. “We hope they’ve replaced animals with something that is modern and based on human anatomy … I hope this change is permanent.”
Angel Lopez is a senior staff writer covering Science and Research. He’s a first-year student from Tyler, Texas and planning to study neuroscience and literary arts. In his free time, you can find him playing ping pong, listening to music, or reading.
