An improved thermo-provocative technique for the diagnostic of disturbed acral arterial perfusion

This work in progress concerns an improved thermo-provocative technique using a finger-stall like actor-sensor-unit with a Peltier module as actor for standardised cooling and sensors for skin temperature and volume pulse. The measurement procedure could be shortened to less than ten minutes. A clustering in symptom-free reference volunteers and patients with disturbed acral arterial perfusion, e.g. vibration induced white finger disease or Raynauld´s phenomenon, can be done by means of the finger´s skin temperature changes. Additional informations, e.g. on the ability of perfusion regulation, can be gained by the area under the volume pulse during cooling down and warming up. The results suggest that the PPG instead of the IPG is suitable if integrative parameters as the area under the volume pulse signal is used. Actually the authors are looking for further parameters of skin temperature and PPG pulse valid for finer clustering the states of acral arterial perfusion disturbances