International scientists addressed and discussed the current status of procedures for better early recognition of risk and optimal therapies for high blood pressure at Vienna Tech Gate in Vienna. Although heart and circulatory-system illnesses are still the most-common cause of death worldwide, only half of such deaths can be explained by classic risk factors. The relatively recent research area of bio-mathematics plays a central role in development of innovative diagnostic procedures. AIT scientists developed a procedure in that regard to determine one's state of health with numbers without the need to perform experiments on patients. AIT has succeeded in developing a technology that is simple and provides exact information about blood pressure in the heart for 24 hours without open-heart measurements. It makes rapid and appropriate treatment and recovery of patients possible.
Siegfried Wassertheurer from AIT's Health & Environment Department says: "A classic blood-pressure measurement device provides information only about the systole, the diastole and the heart beat. High blood pressure has other important parameters such as the elasticity of arteries and the peripheral resistance of vessels.
"Upper-arm blood pressure is therefore different than that in the aorta near the heart. Pressure on the heart can finally be determined through analysis of pulse-wave velocity, which was formerly a very complex and also an invasive method that only specialized clinics could perform.
"With this innovative generation of blood-pressure measurement devices, it has become possible to perform the very important analysis of pulse-wave velocity with a simple upper-arm cuff (or pressure sleeve) that has resulted in new software more or less replacing traditional blood-pressure measurement devices," according to John Cockcroft, professor of cardiology at the Wales Heart Research Institute in Cardiff and guest speaker at AIT's workshops last Thursday.
Hundreds of the devices are already in use and give general practitioners as well as well-known institutes significant advantages in the early detection of cardiovascular illnesses. AIT Austrian Institute of Technology received a research prize for that development at the end of 2010.
AIT Austrian Institute of Technology
AIT Austrian Institute of Technology is Austria's largest research establishment outside a university. With five departments, AIT is a highly-specialized research and development partner for industry. Its researchers focus on the main infrastructure themes of the future: energy, mobility, health & environment, safety & security and foresight & policy development. Around 1,000 researchers in Austria are working on development of tools, technology and solutions for the economy in accord with its motto "Tomorrow Today" focusing on the future. AIT is internationally linked to many universities and research institutes and plays a key role among research and technology establishments on the European level that focus on the main infrastructure themes.