Abstract
Portal blood flow (PBF) can be measured quantitatively by using a B-mode combined pulsed Doppler (BCD) system. Blood flow velocity determined by the Doppler spectrogram and vascular cross-sectional area measured from the B-mode tomographic image enables us to calculate blood flow volume quantitatively.
Using this system, PBF was measured in 88 healthy adults, 13 patients with acute hepatitis (AH), 16 with chronic inactive hepatitis (CIH), 45 with chronic active hepatitis (CAH), 81 with cirrhosis (LC), 16 with idiopathic portal hypertension (IPH) and 39 with hepatoma (HCC).
In patients with CAH, LC, IPH and HCC, the cross-sectional area of the portal vein was larger than normal and the blood flow velocity of the portal vein was smaller than normal. However, in the blood flow volume through the portal vein, there was no significant difference between normal subjects and patients with liver diseases (AH, CIH, CAH, LC, IPH and HCC).
