Surfactant inhalation on CPAP in an in vitro model – influence of patient interface and bypass flow on lung dose

Background: Aerosolized surfactant delivery in preterm infants on continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) could be a new, non invasive treatment option for preterm infants suffering from infant respiratory distress syndrome. Apart from patient dependent factors such as breathing pattern and lung disease severity, and beside nebulizer properties such as aerosol particle size, there is a lack of knowledge which technical parameters of the CPAP system influence lung deposition. We tested different settings in an idealized preterm infant model using the Pulmonary Drug Delivery System (PDDS, Nektar Therapeutics, S…