IT STARTS IN THE WALL:  Early Detection of Vascular Disease through Arterial Waveform Analysis, by Jay N. Cohn, M.D., Professor of Medicine at The University of Minnesota Medical School Cardiovascular Division

“Cardiovascular specialists spend considerable effort on evaluating heart function, including EKGs, echocardiograms, and stress tests, but have been unable to assess the functional and structural abnormality of the arteries PRIOR TO THE LATE PHASE OF ARTERIAL OBSTRUCTION (as determined by angiography).

Clinical research related to arterial waveform analysis has been ongoing at the University of Minnesota Medical School since 1980, and at other clinical investigator sites and medical research centers since about 1988.

The arterial waveform analysis method uses a modified Windkessel model, a well-established electrical analog model, which describes the pressure changes during the diastolic phase of the cardiac cycle in the circulatory system.

This analysis method provides an independent assessment of the elasticity or flexibility of the large arteries which expand to briefly store blood ejected by the heart, and of the small arteries which produce oscillations or reflections in response to the blood pressure waveform generated during each heartbeat. 

By assessing the elasticity of the arterial system, clinical investigators have been able to identify a reduction in arterial elasticity in patients without evidence of traditional risk factors, suggesting early presence of vascular disease. These abnormal blood vessel changes often appear to precede overt signs of cardiovascular disease and the occurrence of a heart attack or stroke by many years.

 Dozens of clinical research studies and pharmaceutical trials have already been completed using this technology, involving more than 2,500 subjects, and resulting in more than 30 scientific articles being published in peer-reviewed medical journals.”