LAUSR

Limb perfusion monitoring is critical for diabetes mellitus (DM) patients as they are vulnerable to vascular complications due to prolonged hyperglycemia. However, current clinical approaches are ineffective in vascular imaging and in assessing vascular function in lower limbs. In this work, a concave ultrasound transducer array-based photoacoustic tomography (PAT) system was used to image the foot dorsal section of a subject, and a total of 7 DM patients and 7 healthy volunteers were enrolled in this study. Hemodynamic changes in foot vessels during vascular occlusion as well as oxygen saturation in rest were analyzed for both groups. The results obtained showed that DM patients have a unique peripheral hemodynamic response to occlusion and a lower level oxygen saturation, compared to that for healthy subjects. This suggests that PAT has the potential to detect vascular dysfunction in DM patients and to measure the effect of treatment. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.