Cerebral blood flow velocity during simultaneous changes in mean arterial pressure and cardiac output in healthy volunteers

PURPOSE: Cerebral blood flow (CBF) needs to be precisely controlled to maintain brain functions. While previously believed to be autoregulated and near constant over a wide blood pressure range, CBF is now understood as more pressure passive. However, there are still questions regarding the integrated nature of CBF regulation and more specifically the role of cardiac output. Our aim was, therefore, to explore the effects of MAP and cardiac output on CBF in a combined model of reduced preload and increased afterload. METHOD: 16 healthy volunteers were exposed to combinations of different levels of simultaneous lower body negative pressure and isometric hand grip. We measured blood velocity in the middle cerebral artery (MCAV) and internal carotid artery (ICAV) by Doppler ultrasound, and cerebral oxygen saturation (ScO(2)) by near-infrared spectroscopy, as surrogates for CBF. The effect of changes in MAP and cardiac output on CBF was estimated with mixed multiple regression. RESULT: Both MAP and cardiac output had independent effects on MCAV, ICAV and ScO(2). For ICAV and ScO(2) there was also a statistically significant interaction effect between MAP and cardiac output. The estimated effect of a change of 10 mmHg in MAP on MCAV was 3.11 cm/s (95% CI 2.51–3.71, P < 0.001), and the effect of a change of 1 L/min in cardiac output was 3.41 cm/s (95% CI 2.82–4.00, P < 0.001). CONCLUSION: The present study indicates that during reductions in cardiac output, both MAP and cardiac output have independent effects on CBF. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s00421-021-04693-6.