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THE MEASUREMENT OF BLOOD FLOW BY THE LOCAL CLEARANCE OF RADIOACTIVE SODIUM

1951; BMJ; Volume: 13; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1136/hrt.13.2.227

1468-201X

H Miller, Geoff Wilson,

Radioactive Decay and Measurement Techniques

The study of the local clearance of radioactive sodium was initiated by Kety (1948) who suggested that the rate of loss of local radioactivity reflected the local effective blood flow.The method has, up to date, been used for the study of blood flow in muscle (Kety, 1949; Cooper et al., 1949 and Cooper, 1949) and it was shown that after application of a tourniquet to check the arterial inflow the number of counts per minute remained constant.On release of the tourniquet there was a rapid decline in the counts per minute attributed to the reactive hypernmia.As the counts thus apparently reflected both the cessation of the circulation while the tourniquet was applied and the subsequent increase on its release, the method was thought suitable for the relative determination of effective local blood flow and useful for studying the circulation in particular in the skin and viscera (Kety, 1949).Obviously such a method would be convenient and simple for the investigation of circulation in organs otherwise inaccessible for circulatory studies.Before such extensive use it is, however, essential to ascertain that the method is capable of determining with reasonable accuracy changes in effective local blood flow.Experiments involving the use of a tourniquet on a limb were not considered sufficient evidence for this assumption, and further investigations on the local clearance of radiosodium in skin and muscle are accordingly presented.