Correlation of Carotid Doppler Flowmetry with Fluid Responsiveness in
Mechanically Ventilated Patients Undergoing Coronary Artery Bypass
Grafting -- A Popular Grey Zone
Abstract
The authors conducted a prospective, observational study to evaluate the
correlation of fluid responsiveness with commonly used carotid
doppler-derived indices like carotid artery blood flow (CBF), carotid
corrected flow time (FTc), respirophasic variation in carotid artery
blood flow peak velocity (ΔVpeak) in patients undergoing CABG. They
claimed that altough only ΔVpeak demonstrated some predictive power with
areas under receiver operating characteristic (AUROC) of 0.671, carotid
doppler ultrasound indices were found to be not dependable as a
substitute for invasive methods to assess fluid responsiveness. The
presence of studies advocating quite different sentiments in the
literature regarding feasibility and reliability show that there is a
long way gone and a long way to go.