[Diagnosis of insufficient perforating veins using thermographic plates]

With the help of thermographic plates developed by the department of physical chemistry of the Martin Luther University Halle it was possible to detect in 50 patients 158 insufficient venae perforantes, which were found by x-ray examination, from total of 175. The causes for 17 insufficient venae perforantes not diagnosed thermographically were inadequate application of the plates in ulcus cruris, the existence of a pair of perforating veins and functionally unimportant bypasses. Plate thermography proved to be suitable in the lower leg for the detection of smaller differences in temperature. Evaluating these results in comparison to the literature references there was no difference between our method and the infrared thermovision. From an economic point of view plate thermography seems to be superior to infrared thermovision. In contrast to this, plate thermography has the disadvantage of a longer time for examination and problems in documentation and registration of the results.