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Cerebral hypoxia historical perspective
Introduction
Overview
Overview
The relationship between brain function and blood flow has been studied since the classical paper of Roy and Sherrington (61) at the end of the 19th century.
Historical Perspective
Historical Perspective
- Despite the absence of quantitative methods, early investigators were able to establish some of the basic principles of the cerebral circulation; among these was a recognition of the dominating influence of carbon dioxide and the reciprocal effect of oxygen (72).
- Interestingly, even the idea that local cerebral blood flow (CBF) was transiently augmented with increased neuronal activation, alluded to by Roy and Sherrington, had received additional qualitative experimental support.
- A listing of the qualitative methods in use at the time, including methods such as venous outflow, radium emanation, and thermocouple, can be found in the 1936 Wolff review (72).
- Nevertheless, despite more than 100 years of effort, there are still major areas concerning the control of the cerebral circulation that remain unknown.
- The observations that decreasing oxygen led to increased blood flow and that the increase was blunted perhaps by the accompanying hypoxia-induced hyperventilation and resultant decreased carbon dioxide remained wholly qualitative until a useful quantitative method, based on inert gases, was developed for measuring CBF and oxygen metabolism by Kety and Schmidt (33, 35).