A Conservative Framework to Derive Preliminary Canine Toxicity Reference Values From Human Data for Contaminated Soil...

Area of Science:

• Environmental Toxicology
• Veterinary Public Health
• Risk Assessment

Background:

• Environmental soil contamination poses risks to humans and companion animals like dogs.
• Current health risk assessments are anthropocentric, neglecting domestic animal exposure to soil contaminants.
• Dogs may experience significant exposure to soil contaminants through ingestion.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a novel framework for adapting human toxicity reference values (TRVs) to canine health risk assessment.
• To establish canine-specific TRVs for threshold-based ingestion exposures to soil pollutants.
• To promote a One Health perspective in environmental risk management.

Main Methods:

• Compiled human ingestion-based TRVs for common soil pollutants.
• Extrapolated human TRVs to dogs using allometric scaling (body mass and metabolic rate).
• Proposed a methodology for canine-specific TRV derivation.

Main Results:

• Successfully adapted human TRVs to derive canine-specific TRVs.
• Established a scientifically grounded framework for canine environmental risk assessment.
• Identified a gap in toxicokinetic data for further refinement.

Conclusions:

• The proposed methodology provides a transparent and adaptable basis for including domestic animals in environmental risk assessments.
• Scientifically grounded, canine-specific TRVs are crucial for contaminated land management.
• Recognizing dogs as co-exposed receptors and sentinels enhances holistic health protection across species.