Arterial stiffness modeling using variations of pulse transit time

In this paper, a finite elements (FE) modeling is used to model effects of the arterial stiffness on the different signal patterns of the pulse transit time (PTT). Four different breathing patterns of the same subject are measured with PTT signal and corresponding finite element model of the straight elastic artery is applied. The computational fluid structure model provides arterial elastic behavior and fitting procedure was applied in order to estimate stiffness of the artery. It was found that same elastic material characteristics were fitted for four different breathing patterns which validate this methodology for possible noninvasive determination of the arterial stiffness.