The Effect of Peripheral Layer Thickness on Pulsatile Flow of Blood in Human Femoral Artery

Abstract

Peripheral artery disease is one among the circulatory problems in the cardiovascular system in which narrowed artery reduces blood to limbs. This paper focus on the effect of peripheral layer thickness on velocity of blood and on the hemodynamic parameters such as wall shear stress and oscillatory shear index in human femoral artery using two-layered model. Owing to the necessity of clinically reliable estimates for hemodynamic parameters, at the time of prognosis and diagnosis of peripheral diseases, in this investigation the physiological pressure gradient of human femoral artery was taken from cardiology literature and is described using McDonalds model. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first primitive study of this kind. Governing equations are solved analytically. Velocity, wall shear stress and oscillatory shear index for different peripheral layer thicknesses are obtained. Dimensional graphs for velocity and wall shear stress are plotted using MATLAB. Quantitative and qualitative analysis shows that the velocity as well as oscillatory shear index in the core region increases as the peripheral layer thickness decreases. Results are interpreted medically which helps to improve the understanding of the state of artery. Comparison of our results with that of single layer model in the literature indicates that single layer model overestimates core region velocity by approximately 65% and underestimates wall shear stress and oscillatory shear index by 84% and 88% respectively. Primitive model employed in the current investigation recommends for more number of subject specific studies before benchmarking the thresholds for the clinically crucial hemodynamic parameters.