Arterial pulse wave analysis can detect vascular alterations in response to therapy in septic shock.

The severe vascular decoupling induced by septic shock may dissociate the physiological relation between pressure and flow in the periphery and this may have important clinical implications. We hypothesize that arterial pulse wave analysis (PWA) can track these vascular alterations and we tested this hypothesis in a swine experiment of septic shock and resuscitation with different drugs that differently interact with the cardiovascular system. PWA was found to effectively detect the different arterial response to treatment, proving to be highly informative in the monitoring of therapy response in septic shock.