Low-frequency variability in the blood volume and in the blood volume pulse measured by photoplethysmography

Besides heart rate and arterial blood pressure, several parameters of the cardiovascular system fluctuate spontaneously. In the current study, the fluctuations of tissue blood content and blood volume pulse were investigated using two parameters of the photoplethysmographic (PPG) signal: the parameter BV, defined by: BV=Const−BL where BL is the baseline of the PPG signal, and the amplitude (AM), which are related to the blood volume and to the systolic blood volume increase, respectively. The PPG measurements were performed on the fingertips of ten healthy male subjects for 5 to 10 min and the PPG signal was digitally analyzed. Both BV and AM show low frequency fluctuations, which, for 23 out of 26 examinations, were positively correlated, with a lag of BV relative to AM. In three examinations, however, the two parameters were inversely correlated. A lower correlation was found between each of these parameters and the PPG period, which is actually the cardiac period. The results show that several mechanisms are involved in the spontaneous periodic fluctuations in the vascoconstriction level, which are known to be mediated by the sympathetic nervous system. The digital PPG provides, therefore, a potential tool for evaluating the role of the sympathetic nerves in the regulation of the microcirculation.