Sharif Digital Repository

Flow mediated dilation (FMD) is a non-invasive method for endothelial function assessment providing an index extracted from ultrasonic B-mode images. Although utilized in the research community, the difficulty of its application and high cost of ultrasonic devices prevent it from being widely used in clinical settings. In this study we show that substituting the ultrasonic device with more easily handled and low cost photoplethysmography and electrocardiography is possible. We introduce new indices based on the photoplethysmogram (PPG) and electrocardiogram (ECG) and show that they are correlated with the ultrasound-based FMD Index. To this end, a conventional ultrasound FMD test was carried... 

This paper presents a low complexity while accurate Heart Rate (HR) estimation technique from signals captured by Photoplethysmographic (PPG) sensors worn on the wrist during intensive physical exercise. Wrist-type PPG signals experience severe Motion Artifacts (MA) that hinder efficient HR estimation especially during intensive physical exercises. To suppress the motion artifacts efficiently, simultaneous 3 dimensional acceleration signals are used as reference MAs. The proposed method achieves an Average Absolute Error (AAE) of 1.19 Beats Per Minute (BPM) on the 12 benchmark PPG recordings in which subjects run at speeds of up to 15 km/h. This method also achieves an AAE of 2.17 BPM on the... 

In this study, at first the cardiovascular system is modeled based on the 1D method and then the simulation of the reactive hyperemia experiment has been applied on the model. In this simulation, by applying a cuff at the brachial artery, the flow downstream of the cuff is occluded. Then with releasing the cuff immediately, a large amount of shear stress, about 4 times the basal amount, is applied downstream of the cuff and consequently to the endothelial cells in a very short moment. Considering a reported experimental transfer function between shear stress and vasodilation, the increase of the artery diameter due to the sudden increase of the shear stress is obtained. Finally, the... 

The digital sensor module is developed to sample the input signal fed from a photo-sensor probe at sampling times ranging from 400-4000 μs equivalent to sampling rates of 2500-250 sample/second (S/s), respectively. The module produces 16-bit data packets which are transmitted serially and plotted to output the photoplethysmography signal (PPG). It displays accurate sampling values (packets) similar to the calculated ones. ©2007 IEEE  

Endothelial dysfunction, which can be noninvasively assessed by flow mediated vasodilation (FMD), predicts an increased rate of adverse cardiovascular events. The endothelial dysfunction is considered as a leading cause of development and progression of the atherosclerotic process. The main aim of this study is to review different non-invasive methods to assess the endothelial dysfunction and to propose enhancements to a new method based on photoplethysmography (PPG). First, non-invasive techniques developed for the evaluation of peripheral endothelial function (including the Doppler ultrasound (US)) will be reviewed. Although noninvasive, US -based techniques present a few disadvantages. To... 

Using simultaneous photoplethysmogram (PPG) and pulse transducer signals from the same finger, a high correlation (Mean: 98.6, STD: 1) is obtained between the AC part of the PPG and estimated volume changes (after normalization). These results point to the fact that in the resting fingertip, PPG signal variations are only due to volume changes and that blood density does not change thus has no contribution  

An approach based pulse on contour analysis is proposed for the development of an aging index for the vascular system. The approach is non-invasive, using photoplethysmography (PPG), which is in wide clinical use. A probe is applied to the subject's finger-tip to provide a measure of the pulse waveform. The measured waveforms are filtered, digitized and post-processed. Individual pulses are extracted and the best pulse was selected by using the best pulse selection algorithm. Pulse contour analysis is then performed with specially formulated PPG fitness equation. Results of measurements taken from 72 subjects are reported. The age range of the subjects was from 19 to 68 years, all of them... 

A PC-based digital lock-in amplifier was implemented completely in software (Labview) for photoplethysmograph (PPG) measurement. Experiments carried out to evaluate the performance of the amplifier show that the system can recover the signals up to 40 dB below the interference (ambient light). This system can be customized later to measure the trans-abdominal PPG signal of pregnant women for fetal heart rate detection. ©2007 IEEE  

Flow mediated dilation (FMD) measurement using ultrasound imaging (FMD-US) has been established as a standard method for assessing the endothelial function. Recently, a less skilled-operator demanding method has been proposed based on the photoplethysmogram (PPG) changes during reactive hyperemia. It was shown that the amplitude of the PPG pulse (FMD-PPG) changed in a quite similar manner to that of the artery diameter in the method of the FMD-US i.e. increases following releasing the cuff and then gradually returns to baseline. In this study PPG changes following reactive hyperaemia were modelled using time-varying passive electrical elements (R, L and C). The output of the electric analog... 

In an effort to identify a useful noninvasive screening tool for cardiovascular diseases (CVD) screening, photoplethysmograph (PPG) signals were acquired and analyzed. These PPG signals were recorded during reactive hyperemia experiments consisting of a 4-minute blood flow blockage of the right arm (RA) brachial artery (BA) using a blood pressure cuff inflator. This procedure is usually done for the assessment of endothelial dysfunction which is a risk factor for developing CVD. In this study, signals of the infrared (IR) and red (R) LED's of the PPG sensor were analyzed. These signals were preprocessed, normalized and slow varying component of the signal (DC values) and the pulsatile...