Indoor Air Quality and Potential Health Risk Impacts of Exposure to Antibiotic Resistant Bacteria in an Office Rooms in Southern Poland

Ewa Brągoszewska and Izabela Biedroń
Additional contact information
Ewa Brągoszewska: Faculty of Power and Environmental Engineering, Department of Air Protection, Silesian University of Technology, 22B Konarskiego St., 44-100 Gliwice, Poland
Izabela Biedroń: Institute for Ecology of Industrial Areas, Environmental Microbiology Unit, 6 Kossutha St., 40-844 Katowice, Poland

IJERPH, 2018, vol. 15, issue 11, 1-17

Abstract: The aims of this article are to characterize: the quantity of culturable bacterial aerosol (QCBA) and the quality of culturable bacterial aerosol (QlCBA) in an office building in Southern Poland during the spring. The average concentration of culturable bacterial aerosol (CCBA) in this building ranged from 424 CFU m −3 to 821 CFU m −3 , below Polish proposals for threshold limit values. Size distributions were unimodal, with a peak of particle bacterial aerodynamic diameters less than 3.3 μm, increasing potentially adverse health effects due to their inhalation. The spring office exposure dose (SPED) of bacterial aerosol was estimated. The highest value of SPED was in April (218 CFU kg −1 ), whereas the lowest was in June (113 CFU kg −1 ). Analysis was undertaken to determine the antibiotic resistance of isolated strains and their ability to form biofilms, which may facilitate the spread of antibiotic resistance genes. In the course of the study, it was found that Staphylococcus xylosus had the greatest ability to form biofilms, while the strains with the highest antibiotic resistance were Micrococcus luteus D and Macrococcus equipercicus . Given that mainly antibiotic-sensitive bacteria from bioaerosol were isolated, which transfers resistance genes to their plasmids, this shows the need for increased monitoring of indoor air quality in workplaces.

Keywords: indoor air quality; health risk assessment; bioaerosol; size distribution; antibiotic resistance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/15/11/2604/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/15/11/2604/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:15:y:2018:i:11:p:2604-:d:184501

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().