The NIH-NIAID Filariasis Research Reagent Resource Center.

Filarial worms cause a variety of tropical diseases in humans; however, they are difficult to study because they have complex life cycles that require arthropod intermediate hosts and mammalian definitive hosts. Research efforts in industrialized countries are further complicated by the fact that some filarial nematodes that cause disease in humans are restricted in host specificity to humans alone. This potentially makes the commitment to research difficult, expensive, and restrictive.

Using an intravenous catheter to carry out abdominal lavage in the gerbil.

Abdominal lavage is used in laboratory rodents for a variety of applications but carries an inherent risk of abdominal organ laceration; therefore, personnel carrying out this procedure must have considerable expertise. In this paper, the authors describe an improved method for delivering sterile media to and collecting peritoneal fluids from dark-clawed Mongolian gerbils (Meriones unguiculatus) that had been peritoneally infected with filarial nematode parasites (genus Brugia). To carry out this gravity-assisted technique, the authors used a catheter to introduce sterile media into the peritoneal cavity of each gerbil and then to passively drain peritoneal fluid and larval worms for collection.