Noninvasive determination of elastic properties and diameter of human limb arteries.

A method involving application of a standard cuff on human limbs has been developed making it possible by a single procedure to make a quantitative determination of blood pressure, elastic resistance of "uninfluenced" an mechanically relaxed arterial vessel walls, their bulk modulus and effective inner diameter. The method which is based on the "elasticity reservoir theory" involves recording arterial pressure recordings during periods of gradual compression and evaluation of the pulsatile blood volume increment under the cuff at the on step wise decompression. The reproducibility of the results and the errors involved were estimated by comparing the results with measurements made on a physical model and on human limbs. This paper presents some results of the application of the method to 113 healthy persons and shows the age dependence of the examined parameters in the upper arms and in the lower leg.