Coronary Artery Analysis

The heart muscle itself has its own set of arteries, capillaries, and veins, as does every other organ in the body. They are called the coronary arteries and veins since they encircle the heart. Coronary arteries are supplied with oxygenated blood from the aorta to the myocardium to keep contracting. The left coronary artery feeds most of the left ventricle, the septum and much of the conduction system. The right coronary artery feeds the right side of the heart, including the sinoatrial (SA) nodes. During diastole the coronaries arteries receive blood to flow freely into the muscle since it is in a relaxed state. During systole, the ventricle contracts and the aortic leaflets close the coronary arteries. The closing of the aortic valves fills in the coronary arteries creating differences between the systolic and diastolic pressure. This pressure is known as pressure pulse (PP) the difference is calculated by subtracting the diastolic pressure from the systolic pressure. There are two factors that may impact the PP, the stroke volume and the elasticity of the arterial system. Loss of arteries elasticity result in decreased response to the normal stimuli for dilation or constriction of the vessels to meet the tissues needs (Karch, 2013). The PP differences is then related to arterial stiffness and associated to coronary artery disease (CAD). …show more content…
This conditioning causes increase of systolic blood pressure, which increase the systolic workload of the left ventricle and reduce diastolic compliance. As a result, there is increase in oxygen consumption, left ventricular hypotrophy and imbalance in myocardial oxygen supply and demand and a widening in PP (Steppan, Barodka, Berkowitz, & Nyhan, 2011). Vascular stiffness can be measured by pulse wave velocity (PWV), the speed at which pressure waves move along the artery, which is increased with