Quantitation of the pressing force required for feeling peripheral pulses

A simple method has been developed for the quantitation of the pressing force, which is required to feel arterial pulse optimally by using finger tips on the radial artery. This force was measured by our transducer, which replaces the touch force generated by finger tips on the artery. This force, called the dead load, was traced 18 times in 8 hours on a volunteer, and the coefficient of variation of this load was 0.12. We selected 15 volunteers who had moderate touching force for plethysmography, and their dead loads were measured repeatedly 68 times over a week, where the mean and the standard deviation was 60 +/- 15 grams. The problems related to these research methodologies, which can bridge between traditional Chinese medicine and western medicine, were also discussed briefly.