Table 1.

Rodent Models of Sepsis.

	Pros	Cons
Bacterial and Fungal Infection	Selected pathogens of choice can be tested, lack of surgical insult, and ability to study progression of infection in relation to severity.	Strain, dose, and route dependence on severity; single pathogen may not reflect human sepsis.
Bacteria Clot Implantation	Allows slow pathogen release, produces progressive sepsis, and prolonged immunometabolic dysregulation.	Reproducibility depends on clot standardization.
Endotoxemia	Simple procedure, reproducibility, and acute response.	Dependence on toxin, dose, and route. Differs from clinical sepsis.
Intraperitoneal
Cecal Ligation and Puncture	Polymicrobial sepsis. Cardio-metabolic and immune response similar to clinical sepsis. Organ dysfunction. Simple surgical procedure.	Variability of the model (needle size, number of punctures, ligated cecum length). Surgical insult.
Cecal Slurry	Reproducibility, ease of use, lack of surgical trauma, and organ dysfunction.	Batch-to-batch variation in the slurry.
Colon Ascendens Stent Peritonitis	Polymicrobial infection, organ dysfunction, and inflammatory response.	Surgical insult, variability due to stent size, and challenging surgical model.
Two-Hit (e.g., CLP followed by lung infection)	Mimics biphasic multiorgan failure.	Variability depending on duration between hits, nature of each hit, and sequence of hits.