Analysis of the microcirculatory pulse wave: age-related alterations

Morphological analysis of the pulse wave of central blood pressure signal is commonly used for the study of cardiac and vascular properties, but very few attempts were performed for analyzing the peripheral pulse wave of blood flow. In this work, we analyzed this waveform using classical methods, based on the application of FFT, followed by principal components analysis, for assessing the properties of the blood flow. As a sample problem, we evaluated the capability of the proposed method of assessing the alterations correlated with the aging of the vascular system. Results show a good discrimination between the different age groups, confirming the validity of the approach.