Significance: Pulsatility is a vital characteristic of the cardiovascular system. Characterization of the pulsatility pattern locally in the peripheral microvasculature is currently not readily available and would provide an additional source of information, which may prove important in understanding the pathophysiology of arterial stiffening, vascular ageing, and their linkage with cardiovascular disease development. Aim: We aim to confirm the suitability of speckle decorrelation optical coherence tomography angiography (OCTA) under various noncontact/contact scanning protocols for the visualization of pulsatility patterns in vessel-free tissue and in the microvasculature of peripheral human skin. Results: Results from five healthy subjects show distinct pulsatile patterns both in vessel-free tissue with either noncontact or contact imaging and in individual microvessels with contact imaging. Respectively, these patterns are likely caused by the pulsatile pressure and pulsatile blood flow. The pulse rates show good agreement with those from pulse oximetry, confirming that the pulsatile signatures reflect pulsatile hemodynamics. Conclusions: This study demonstrates the potential of speckle decorrelation OCTA for measuring localized peripheral cutaneous pulsatility and defines scanning protocols necessary to undertake such measurements. Noncontact imaging should be used for the study of pulsatility in vessel-free tissue and contact imaging with strong mechanical coupling in individual microvessels. Further studies of microcirculation based upon this method and protocols are warranted.

中文翻译：

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通过散斑去相关光学相干断层扫描血管造影检测皮肤微循环中的局部搏动运动。

意义：搏动性是心血管系统的一个重要特征。外周微血管局部搏动模式的特征目前还不容易获得，这将提供额外的信息来源，这对于理解动脉硬化、血管老化的病理生理学及其与心血管疾病发展的联系可能很重要。目的：我们旨在确认散斑去相关光学相干断层扫描血管造影 (OCTA) 在各种非接触/接触扫描协议下的适用性，用于可视化无血管组织和外周人体皮肤微血管系统的搏动模式。结果：来自五名健康受试者的结果在具有非接触式或接触式成像的无血管组织和具有接触式成像的单个微血管中均显示出不同的脉动模式。分别地，这些模式可能是由脉动压力和脉动血流引起的。脉搏率与脉搏血氧饱和度非常吻合，证实了脉动特征反映了脉动血流动力学。结论：这项研究证明了散斑去相关 OCTA 在测量局部外周皮肤搏动方面的潜力，并定义了进行此类测量所需的扫描协议。非接触式成像应用于研究无血管组织的搏动性，以及在单个微血管中具有强机械耦合的接触式成像。