Iliofemoral Venous Pressure Correlates with Intraabdominal Pressure in Morbidly Obese Patients

Clinically, it has been observed that severely and morbidly obese individuals more often have venous leg symptoms related to venous stasis than normal-weight persons have. Obesity is associated with an increased intraabdominal pressure (IAP). The increased IAP in severely and morbidly obese patients would reasonably cause an elevated iliofemoral venous pressure (IFVP), which transmits via incompetent femoral veins, causing venous stasis in the lower limbs. The aim of this study was to determine whether the elevated IAP assessed by the urinary bladder pressure (UBP) corresponded with an increased directly measured IFVP. Fifteen women with morbid obesity were investigated with simultaneous UBP and direct iliofemoral vein pressures. Four normal-weight controls were investigated in the same manner. The obese patients had significantly higher UBP than the controls had, 19.1 and 8.5 cm H2O, respectively. They also had elevated IFVP compared with the controls, 19.7 and 7.5 cm H2O, respectively, and these IFVPs correlated well with the UBPs. The assumption that increased IAP in morbidly obese patients causes increased IFVP was consequently determined. To our knowledge, this has not previously been demonstrated in human individuals. How these elevated pressures contribute to the development of lower limb venous insufficiency is subject to further studies.