[Study on splanchnic circulation: measurement of the liver blood flow]

In anesthetized patients during abdominal surgery, hepatic artery and portal vein flows were measured simultaneously utilizing an ultrasonic transit-time volume flowmeter. The total hepatic blood flow was 994.6 +/- 52.4 ml/min. The hepatic artery flow and the portal vein flow were 260.0 +/- 23.8 ml/min and 730.8 +/- 41.3 ml/min, respectively. The ratio of hepatic artery flow to portal vein flow was 0.37 +/- 0.04. A significant increase in hepatic artery flow (p less than 0.01) followed portal vein occlusion, whereas no significant change was observed in portal vein flow after hepatic artery occlusion. Common hepatic artery occlusion resulted in a significant decrease in hepatic artery flow (p less than 0.05), but no significant change was observed in portal vein flow. The present study firstly demonstrated that ultrasonic transit-time volume flowmeter is a device to quantitatively assess hepatic artery and portal vein flows with good reproducibility and stability in human subjects. This easy and simple technique seemed to have wide clinical application to abdominal surgery and would have a promising in studying splanchnic blood flows in various situations such as in cases of hepatectomy and portal hypertension.