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Detecting extracranial cerebrovascular disease with noninvasive techniques
American Family Physician
|January 1, 1978
Summary
The directional Doppler ophthalmic test is the most useful noninvasive screening tool for extracranial cerebrovascular disease currently available. While other methods exist, they are often unreliable or require expensive equipment.
Area of Science:
- Vascular Medicine
- Diagnostic Imaging
Background:
- Noninvasive screening for extracranial cerebrovascular disease lacks a definitive preeminent procedure.
- Existing methods like ophthalmodynamometry, ocular plethysmography, and thermography have limitations in reliability and cost.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the efficacy of various noninvasive screening tests for extracranial cerebrovascular disease.
- To identify the most useful diagnostic tool among currently available noninvasive techniques.
Main Methods:
- Review and comparison of noninvasive screening tests including ophthalmodynamometry, ocular plethysmography, thermography, and Doppler visualization.
- Assessment of reliability, cost, and practicality of each method.
Main Results:
- Ophthalmodynamometry is simple but often unreliable.
- Ocular plethysmography and thermography are more complex, requiring expensive equipment and showing variable reliability.
- Doppler visualization of the carotid bifurcation shows promise but is still experimental.
- The directional Doppler ophthalmic test demonstrated the most utility in the authors' experience.
Conclusions:
- No single noninvasive test for extracranial cerebrovascular disease is currently superior.
- The directional Doppler ophthalmic test is the most useful available technique based on the authors' findings.
- Further research into Doppler visualization may yield improved diagnostic tools.