The urinary tract plays an important role in removing wastes and extra water in non-human primates and often demonstrates test article-related findings in nonclinical safety assessment studies. Furthermore, the urinary tract also displays multiple background findings, many of which are specific to non-human primates. This chapter discusses renal anatomy and the normal urinary system histology in non-human primates, particularly the features that are relevant to nonclinical safety assessment studies. The chapter also includes sections on common congenital, degenerative, inflammatory, miscellaneous and infectious diseases in the non-human primate urinary tract. The chapter concludes with a discussion of common toxicologic findings in the non-human primate urinary tract.

We have developed a modified canine model of femoral arterial thrombolysis that offers several practical advantages, including the lack of requirement for ateriography and the direct, continuous measurement of blood flow by Doppler flowmetry. In closed-chest, anesthetised dogs, a hollow catheter is advanced to either femoral artery via the left carotid artery. A flexible guidewire is advanced to the femoral artery through the catheter. The latter is withdrawn and a copper coil slipped over the guidewire, inserted through the carotid arterial incision, and pushed with the same hollow catheter to the femoral artery. The guidewire is withdrawn and replaced by a small catheter if local instillation of a thrombolytic agent is desired. The hollow, guiding catheter is also withdrawn, restoring flow through the artery. An occlusive platelet-rich thrombus forms within 12 ± 1 min. Both intravenous and intraarterial streptokinase or tissue plasminogen activator lyse these thrombi dose-dependently. The direct, continuous measurement of femoral arterial blood flow enables the exact moment of thrombolysis and reocclusion as well as the magnitude of blood flow after lysis to be quantified accurately. Cyclic, repetitive reocclusions, indicative of thrombus formation and dislodgement, often precede permanent reocclusion, making the model suitable for evaluation of potential antithrombotic agents.