Sometimes, a matter that appears to be trivial can initiate major disagreements. That is what happened after a monthly meeting of the Great Eastern University IACUC. Dr. Lawrence Covelli opened the meeting by asking for a motion to approve the minutes of the previous month's meeting. A motion was made and seconded, but Lana Phillipe, the IACUC administrator, whispered to Covelli that he had miscounted and there were not enough members present to make a quorum. “No problem,” said Covelli, “we'll wait for a quorum and approve the minutes later on.” When the quorum was present, Covelli began what turned out to be a long meeting, and by the time he remembered to ask for a vote on the minutes, members already were drifting out of the room, and once again, there was no quorum. Unbothered, Covelli said he would just poll the members by e-mail and get the minutes approved that way. That statement initiated his disagreement with Phillipe.

Phillipe was adamant that polling the committee for a vote on the minutes was unacceptable to both the US Department of Agriculture/Animal Care and the National Institutes of Health/Office of Laboratory Animal Welfare. Covelli was equally adamant that polling was only unacceptable under specific conditions, such as voting on the suspension of an animal activity or full committee review of a protocol. Covelli defended polling in other instances by using the Designated Member Review process as an example. Initially, the IACUC office would poll committee members to see if any person requested a full committee review. Phillipe disagreed with the comparison, saying that federal regulations did not require a full committee meeting to make that initial decision, because doing so would largely defeat the purpose of a Designated Member Review. She then reminded Covelli that both the Animal Welfare Act Regulations1 and the Public Health Service Policy on Humane Care and Use of Laboratory Animals2 require the keeping of minutes of IACUC meetings and, therefore, any vote to approve, modify or disapprove the minutes should be made like any other IACUC vote: at a quorum of the full committee and not by polling members after the meeting ended. “Oh,” said Covelli, now becoming sarcastic, “are you saying that I can't poll the committee to see if we should go ahead with an investigation of a complaint?” “That's right,” countered Phillipe, “you cannot use polling as a means of getting an IACUC vote that is directly or indirectly mandated by federal regulations.”

Who do you think is right: Covelli or Phillipe?

Response to Protocol Review: Assurance should dictate

Response to Protocol Review: Convened meeting for approval

Response to Protocol Review: Quorum requires convened meeting

Response to Protocol Review: A word from OLAW and USDA