Diana Gianluca, Scardulla Francesco, Puleo Silvia, Pasta Salvatore, D'Acquisto Leonardo
Department of Engineering, University of Palermo, Viale delle Scienze, Ed. 8, 90128 Palermo, Italy.
Sensors (Basel). 2025 May 24;25(11):3301. doi: 10.3390/s25113301.
With advancing age, blood vessels undergo deterioration that causes structural and functional changes, including a progressive increase in arterial wall stiffness. Since arterial stiffness is closely linked to the potential risks of cardiovascular diseases, which remains the leading cause of global mortality, it has become essential to develop effective techniques for early diagnosis and continuous monitoring over time. Photoplethysmography, a low-cost and non-invasive technology that measures blood volume changes, has gained increasing popularity in recent years and has proven to be a potential valuable tool for estimating arterial stiffness. This study employs an in vitro experimental setup designed to simulate the cardiovascular system performing under controlled velocity and pressure conditions, in which silicone phantom models with different geometric and mechanical properties were implemented to evaluate their stiffness using a pair of photoplethysmographic sensors. These were employed to measure the pulse wave velocity, currently considered the reference technique for estimating arterial stiffness, correlated through the well-known Moens-Korteweg equation. Photoplethysmographic sensors were placed at three specific distances to determine an optimal configuration for assessing arterial stiffness. Results showed the best performance for softer vascular models at a 15 cm sensor distance, with measurements demonstrating satisfactory accuracy. Variability and standard deviation values increased with model stiffness. The aim of this study is to improve the use of photoplethysmographic sensors for monitoring the mechanical properties of blood vessels and, therefore, to prevent potential cardiovascular diseases.
随着年龄的增长，血管会发生退化，导致结构和功能发生变化，包括动脉壁硬度逐渐增加。由于动脉硬度与心血管疾病的潜在风险密切相关，而心血管疾病仍然是全球死亡的主要原因，因此开发有效的早期诊断和长期持续监测技术变得至关重要。光电容积脉搏波描记法是一种测量血容量变化的低成本、非侵入性技术，近年来越来越受欢迎，并已被证明是估计动脉硬度的一种潜在有价值的工具。本研究采用体外实验装置，旨在模拟在受控速度和压力条件下运行的心血管系统，其中使用具有不同几何和机械特性的硅胶模型，通过一对光电容积脉搏波描记传感器评估其硬度。这些传感器用于测量脉搏波速度，脉搏波速度目前被认为是估计动脉硬度的参考技术，通过著名的门斯 - 科特韦格方程进行关联。光电容积脉搏波描记传感器放置在三个特定距离处，以确定评估动脉硬度的最佳配置。结果表明，在传感器距离为15厘米时，较软的血管模型表现最佳，测量结果显示出令人满意的准确性。随着模型硬度的增加，变异性和标准差数值增大。本研究的目的是改进光电容积脉搏波描记传感器在监测血管力学性能方面的应用，从而预防潜在的心血管疾病。
