Pulmonary venous waterfall and perivenous pressure in the living dog

Evidence has been obtained that a waterfall effect occurs in the pulmonary veins of the living dog. Anesthetized open-chest dogs were used. Small catheters were passed from the left atrium retrogradely up the pulmonary veins and venous tributaries until they finally pierced the venous walls. They were then pulled out through the surface of the lung until their bellshaped inner ends wedged in small side branches of the vein. They were used to measure upstream venous pressures via the occluded tributary without occlusion of the vein. The pulmonary lymphatics and bronchial circulation were untouched. Alveolar pressure (transpulmonary pressure, Ptp) was held constant during the periods of measurement. We found that intrapulmonary (upstream) venous pressures did not rise with elevation of left atrial (downstream) pressures at any Ptp until a pressure of at least 7 cmH2O above the base of the lung was exceeded. This left atrial pressure (below which a venous waterfall or flow-limiting segment effect was present) increased with Ptp when Ptp exceeded about 15 cmH2O. The waterfall occurs in the larger veins at the lung surface. Its presence and location suggest that intrapulmonary veins in the living animal are held open by the surrounding lung tissue and that neither the flow through them nor their contained volume is influenced by left atrial pressure when this is low.