This study develops a dose response model for Pseudomonas aeruginosa for the inhalation route of exposure using pre-existing data. P. aeruginosa is an opportunistic pathogen capable of causing community and hospital-acquired lung infections. As such, a dose response model for this route of exposure is needed to assess risks posed by the inhalation of aerosols from showers, humidifiers, or hot tubs contaminated with P. aeruginosa. Single-hit theory models traditionally used for dose response modeling did not provide significant fits to the limited available data. The multi-hit dose response model operates under the cooperativity theory and did provide a significant fit, suggesting that a single P. aeruginosa bacterium is not sufficient to initiate a pulmonary infection in an immunocompetent host. A hierarchical Bayesian analysis was used to benchmark this model against additional dose response experiments and results further suggested that the multi-hit model may better represent the dose response behavior for this exposure route. The best fitting model has an LD₅₀ of 2,588,047 Colony Forming Units. This model can be used to quantify risk in inhalation exposure scenarios, however, due to the limited amount of primary data, it is especially important for any future risk assessment to analyze the impact that using different dose response models may have on the final risk estimates and recommended control measures.

这项研究使用现有数据为暴露的吸入途径开发了铜绿假单胞菌的剂量反应模型。铜绿假单胞菌是一种机会病原体，能够引起社区和医院获得的肺部感染。因此，需要针对该暴露途径的剂量反应模型来评估由被铜绿假单胞菌污染的淋浴，加湿器或热水浴缸吸入气溶胶所引起的风险。传统上用于剂量反应模型的单击理论模型并未对有限的可用数据提供明显的拟合。多剂量反应模型在协同理论下运行，确实提供了显着的拟合度，表明单个铜绿假单胞菌细菌不足以在具有免疫能力的宿主中引发肺部感染。分层贝叶斯分析被用来对照额外的剂量反应实验对该模型进行基准测试，结果进一步表明，多重打击模型可能更好地代表了该暴露途径的剂量反应行为。最佳拟合模型的LD ₅₀为2,588,047菌落形成单位。该模型可用于量化吸入暴露场景中的风险，但是，由于主要数据量有限，对于任何未来的风险评估而言，分析使用不同剂量反应模型可能对最终风险估计值产生的影响尤为重要和建议的控制措施。