Measurement of organ blood flow with coloured microspheres: a first time-saving improvement using automated spectrophotometry

The authors report on the development and application of automated spectrophotometry for regional blood flow measurement using the coloured microsphere (CM) dye-extraction technique. A software program running under Microsoft Windows 3.1 was written to simultaneously control an autosampler, sipper pump, pressure valves and spectrophotometer with an exclusively designed small-volume flow-cell. The system allowed consecutive measurements of over 200 tissue samples in volumes as small as 40 μL without any attendance. The system was validated in eight chronically instrumented dogs. A comparison between the advanced CM technique and the standard radionuclide microspheres method demonstrated a strong correlation for blood flows to various organs in awake animals. The system proved to be a reliable, user-friendly and time-saving application for the CM dye-extraction technique