Transcranial Doppler-estimated versus thermodilution-estimated cerebral blood flow during cardiac operations. Influence of temperature and arterial carbon dioxide tension.

The ability of the noninvasive continuous transcranial Doppler technique to reflect changes in cerebral blood flow during cardiac operations was evaluated in seven adults. Middle cerebral artery blood flow velocity changes were compared with simultaneous thermodilution measurements of venous blood flow in the ipsilateral internal jugular vein during 11 preset stages of the procedure. Cerebral blood flow was varied by changes in arterial carbon dioxide tension and temperature. High-dose fentanyl-droperidol anesthesia and alpha-stat pH management were employed. To facilitate comparisons between the two methods, the individual awake values of middle cerebral artery flow velocity (45.1 +/- 3.3 cm/sec, mean +/- standard error of the mean) and jugular venous blood flow (382 +/- 37 ml/min) were normalized (100%). Cerebral metabolic rate for oxygen was calculated as the product of jugular arteriovenous oxygen content difference and middle cerebral artery flow velocity or jugular venous blood flow, respectively. The individual correlations between the two flow estimates varied between 0.76 and 0.87 (median 0.83), and the correlation of the combined data from all seven patients was 0.77 (p less than 0.0001). Variations in arterial carbon dioxide tension induced significant changes in the two flow estimates both during normothermia before cardiopulmonary bypass and at deep hypothermia (20 degrees C) during cardiopulmonary bypass. The significant arterial carbon dioxide tension changes had no significant effects either on Doppler- or thermodilution-estimated cerebral metabolic rate for oxygen. Deep hypothermia (20 degrees C) reduced Doppler- and thermodilution-estimated cerebral metabolic rate for oxygen to 22.0% +/- 3.9% and 20.6% +/- 6.9% of the awake levels, respectively. The study supports the validity of using middle cerebral arterial flow velocity changes as an estimate of changes in volume flow through the brain during cardiac operations.