Background and Aims: Peripheral artery occlusive disease (PAOD) is a common atherosclerosis manifestation, which affects over 20% of Europeans above 55 years old. One of the most important non-invasive forms of PAOD treatment, the physical training, has been recently improved by adding vein blood flow restriction (BFR) and cooling. Our aim was to evaluate acute endothelial and angiogenic response to such type of treatment.
Methods: 35 healthy volunteers (age 24,8±2,6; 51,4% males) completed a 21-minutes interval exercise on cross trainer device with vein occlusion performed by cooling liquid pressure cuffs (arms: 40 mmHg; legs: 65 mmHg) and cooling seat. Endothelium functions and angiogenic processes were monitored with laboratory parameters - vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), clusters of differentiation (CD31, CD34) and imaging examinations – flow-mediated dilatation (FMD), stiffness index (SI), reflexion index (RI), reactive hyperaemia index (RHI) and augmentation index (AI). All examinations were performed prior as well as 20-30 minutes after the exercise.
Results: All of the laboratory parameters were significantly elevated after the training – CD34 (0.031 vs 0.371, p<0.0001), CD31 (9.61 vs 10.71, p<0.0001) and VEGF (32.20 vs 39.62, p=0,0002). Moreover, physical training resulted in RI (69.52 vs 65.37 p=0.013) and SI decrease (7.60 vs 7.12 p=0.024). RHI, FMD and AI weren’t significantly influenced by exercise.
Conclusion: BFR training significantly stimulates acute angiogenic response influences and moderately affects endothelial functions. Results from this pilot study will be implemented into a larger research project including patients with PAOD to confirm these findings and check the long term effects.

06 - INFLUENCE OF RESTRICTED BLOOD FLOW TRAINING WITH COOLING ON ACUTE ANGIOGENIC AND ENDOTHELIAL RESPONSE - THE PILOT STUDY RESULTS