Feline Palatability & Safety Study for Novel Veterinary Therapeutic
The Challenge
A mid-size veterinary pharmaceutical company had developed a promising new broad-spectrum anti-parasitic compound for cats. While the active ingredient showed excellent efficacy in preliminary studies, early field trials revealed a critical commercial problem: fewer than 40% of cats would voluntarily consume the oral formulation. Pet owners reported difficulty administering the medication, leading to poor treatment compliance and reduced real-world efficacy. The company needed to reformulate the product for improved palatability while simultaneously generating the safety data required for FDA Center for Veterinary Medicine (CVM) submission. They required a facility with both palatability testing expertise and GLP toxicology capabilities to run concurrent programs.
Our Solution
Meramec's feline research team designed a two-track concurrent program. Track A was a palatability optimization study using our 60-cat colony, testing 8 flavor formulation variants through paired-preference methodology over 6 weeks. Each formulation was evaluated against the original and a market-leading competitor product. Daily food consumption, approach latency, and voluntary acceptance rates were measured. Track B was a 28-day repeated oral dose toxicity study per FDA-CVM guidance, conducted under full GLP compliance with the top two palatability performers. The study included daily clinical observations, weekly body weight measurements, hematology and clinical chemistry panels at days 0, 14, and 28, gross necropsy, and histopathological examination of 40+ tissues.
The Results
The palatability study identified a chicken-liver flavored soft chew formulation that achieved a 94% voluntary acceptance rate — more than double the original formulation and 15% higher than the market-leading competitor. The concurrent 28-day safety study demonstrated a clean toxicological profile at 3x the proposed therapeutic dose, with no treatment-related adverse findings in any parameter. The integrated data package supported a successful FDA-CVM submission. The product launched 4 months ahead of the revised schedule, and first-year sales exceeded projections by 30%, attributed largely to the superior palatability driving owner compliance.