Abnormal haemodynamic postural response in patients with chronic heart failure.

Aim: The objective was to evaluate in treated heart failure (HF) patients whether multidrug therapy interferes with the cardiovascular autonomic response to postural stress.

Methods And Results: Blood pressure (BP; Finapres), heart rate (HR), stroke volume, and total peripheral resistance (TPR) responses to standing up were measured in 33 HF patients and 10 healthy age-matched controls. Ten hypertensive (HT) patients treated with a similar combination of drugs but without heart failure served as reference subjects to account for use of medication.

Active standing reduces wave reflection in the presence of increased peripheral resistance in young and old healthy individuals.

Objective: Pressure wave reflections are age-dependent and generally assumed to increase with increasing peripheral resistance. We sought to determine the effect of standing on wave reflection in healthy older and younger individuals and the influence of increased peripheral resistance.

Methods: During supine rest and active standing, continuous finger arterial blood pressure was measured.

Effects of aging on the cerebrovascular orthostatic response.

When healthy subjects stand up, it is associated with a reduction in cerebral blood velocity and oxygenation although cerebral autoregulation would be considered to prevent a decrease in cerebral perfusion. Aging is associated with a higher incidence of falls, and in the elderly falls may occur particularly during the adaptation to postural change. This study evaluated the cerebrovascular adaptation to postural change in 15 healthy younger (YNG) vs.

Leg crossing improves orthostatic tolerance in healthy subjects: a placebo-controlled crossover study.

Vasovagal syncope is the most common cause of transient loss of consciousness, and recurrent vasovagal fainting has a profound impact on quality of life. Physical countermaneuvers are applied as a means of tertiary prevention but have so far only proven useful at the onset of a faint. This placebo-controlled crossover study tested the hypothesis that leg crossing increases orthostatic tolerance.

Varying the heart rate response to dynamic exercise in pacemaker-dependent subjects: effects on cardiac output and cerebral blood velocity.

Cerebral blood flow increases upon the transition from rest to moderate exercise, but becomes affected when the ability to raise CO (cardiac output) is limited. HR (heart rate) is considered to contribute significantly to the increase in CO in the early stages of dynamic exercise. The aim of the present study was to test whether manipulation of the HR response in patients dependent on permanent rate-responsive ventricular pacing contributes to the increase in CO, MCA V(mean) [mean MCA (middle cerebral artery) velocity] and work capacity during exercise.

Non-invasive pulsatile arterial pressure and stroke volume changes from the human finger.

In this paper we review recent developments in the methodology of non-invasive finger arterial pressure measurement and the information about arterial flow that can be obtained from it. Continuous measurement of finger pressure based on the volume-clamp method was introduced in the early 1980s both for research purposes and for clinical medicine. Finger pressure tracks intra-arterial pressure but the pressure waves may differ systematically both in shape and magnitude.

Reconstruction of brachial pressure from finger arterial pressure during orthostasis.

Introduction: In patients with recurrent syncope, monitoring of intra-arterial pressure during orthostatic stress testing is recommended because of the potentially sudden and rapid development of hypotension. Replacing brachial arterial pressure (BAP) by the non-invasively obtained finger arterial pressure (FinAP) has advantages because catheterization in itself may provoke a syncope.

Objective: To investigate whether reconstruction of the brachial pressure curve (ReBAP) from FinAP can account for systolic and diastolic offset in the recorded pressure on the transition from a supine to an upright position and during maintained postural stress.