Pneumonia induced by multidrug resistant (MDR) Acinetobacter baumannii strains is among the most common and deadly forms of healthcare acquired infections. Animal models play a critical role during the preclinical assessment of novel therapeutic approaches, however, only a self-limiting pneumonia with no or limited local bacterial replication is frequently obtained when MDR A. baumannii is the pathogen.
To strengthen and characterise a sustained lung infection model, in this publication, we focus on:
- the ability of intranasal inoculation, intratracheal instillation and oropharyngeal aspiration methods of administration of the bacterial challenge to induce a robust pneumonia in mice
- the characterisation of the infection model obtained after intratracheal instillation and oropharyngeal aspiration in terms of histopathological examination of pulmonary lesions, biomarkers of inflammation and leukocytes cells infiltration after treatment with either vehicle or with the antibiotic tigecycline efficacious into reducing lung bacterial load.