A simple alopecia scoring system for use in colony management of laboratory-housed primates.

Background Alopecia in captive primates continues to receive attention from animal care personnel and regulatory agencies. However, a method that enables personnel to reliably score alopecia over time and under various conditions has proven difficult to achieve. Methods The scoring system developed by the behavioral and veterinary staffs at the Washington National Primate Research Center (WaNPRC) uses the rule of 9s to estimate the percentage of the body affected with alopecia (severity) and how the alopecia presents itself (pattern). Training and scoring can conveniently be managed using photographic images, cage-side observations, and/or physical examinations. Results Personnel with varying degrees of experience were quickly trained with reliability scores ranging from 0.82 to 0.96 for severity and 0.82 to 0.89 for pattern using Cohen's κ. Conclusions This system allows for reliable and consistent scoring across species, sex, age, housing condition, seasons, clinical or behavioral treatments, and level of personnel experience.