Authors:
V. E. Antsiperov
1
;
G. K. Mansurov
1
and
A. S. Bugaev
2
Affiliations:
1
Kotelnikov Institute of Radioengineering and Electronics of RAS, Mokhovaya 11-7, Moscow, Russian Federation
;
2
Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, Institutskiy per. 9, Dolgoprudny, Russian Federation
Keyword(s):
Non-invasive Arterial Blood Pressure Monitoring, Pneumatic Sensor, Pulse Wave Transit Time, Pulse Wave Velocity, ECG Synchronization, Atherosclerosis Diagnosis.
Abstract:
The article discusses a new method for diagnosing atherosclerosis with the help of a pneumatic blood pressure sensor recently developed by the authors. Since atherosclerosis is a progressive disease characterized by the deposition of cholesterol and certain fractions of lipoproteins on the walls of blood vessels, it is always accompanied by an increase in stiffness of the artery walls. One technique to assess arterial stiffness, is the measurement of arterial pulse wave velocity, that is the distance traveled by blood flow divided by the time it takes to travel that distance. So the direct method for estimating pulse wave velocity is to measure the transit time of a pulse wave between a pair of artery points by means, for example, of any tonometric sensors. In this connection the paper discusses the possibility of using a new type of sensors developed by the authors —– pneumatic sensors —to measure the pulse wave transit time. However, given the existing features of these sensors and
, accordingly, the special features of pressure measurements, it was necessary to significantly modify the direct method for estimating pulse wave velocity. The main modification characterizing the new, indirect method consists in evaluating the delay of the pulse wave at the points of the artery with respect to some characteristic moment of a synchronous ECG (e.g. the time moment of R–peak, that corresponds to heart ventricles contractions). The details of this method and its modification in the form of a simplified single–point method of estimating pulse wave velocity form the main content of the work.
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