Animal model for anaerobic lung abscess.

There are no satisfactory animal models for the study of anaerobic lung abscess. Aspiration of food, gastric mucin, or hydrochloric acid, or any combination of these, along with oropharyngeal bacteria, is commonly believed to cause aspiration pneumonia and lung abscess. In the animal model described, none of the adjuvants was effective in producing anaerobic lung abscesses. Anaerobic bacteria derived from dental scrapings of a healthy adult (Peptococcus morbillorum, Fusobacterium nucleatum, Eubacterium lentum, and Bacteroides fragilis), when inoculated transtracheally without any adjuvants into New Zealand male white rabbits, consistently produced lung abscesses. Neither B fragilis by itself nor a mixture of P. morbillorum, F. nucleatum, and E. lentum without the addition of B. fragilis produced lung abscesses. The bacterial isolates used in this study were stored in prereduced chopped-meat-glucose medium and subcultured several times and were found effective in reproducing anaerobic lung abscesses repeatedly. This animal model is suitable for the study of pathogenesis, diagnosis, and treatment of B. fragilis-associated anaerobic lung abscess.