[Concepts of basic physics that every cardiovascular surgeon should know: part I - mechanics of fluids]

Rev Bras Cir Cardiovasc. 2010 Jan-Mar;25(1):1-10. doi: 10.1590/s0102-76382010000100006.
[Article in Portuguese]

Abstract

The professional activity that the cardiovascular surgeon performs is much more than a simple gesture to mechanically operate the patient's heart. There is in every act of intraoperative most notions of physiology and physics than we generally realize. This paper discusses, in the light of mathematics, on the dynamics of fluids, ie blood, focused on invasive measurements of blood pressure, the effect of vessel size on its internal resistance and the flow passing through it in conversion of various units of measurements of pressure and resistance, blood viscosity and its relationship to the vessel, hemodilution, differences in laminar and turbulent flow, velocity and blood pressure and wall tension after a stenosis and the origin of poststenotic aneurysm. This study is not to enable the reader to the knowledge of all physics, but to show it as a useful tool in explaining phenomena known in the routine of cardiovascular surgery.

Publication types

  • English Abstract

MeSH terms

  • Algorithms
  • Blood Flow Velocity
  • Cardiovascular Surgical Procedures / education*
  • Hematocrit
  • Hemodynamics / physiology*
  • Hemorheology / physiology
  • Humans
  • Hydrostatic Pressure
  • Physics*
  • Vascular Resistance / physiology