Basics Myocardium & Intermittence

• Myocardium & Intermittence pt1:

  • To a certain extent the myocardium makes up for this intermittent pattern of perfusion by being very efficient at extracting O2 from the coronary blood supply
  • This efficiency can be demonstrated by examining the resting a-vO2 difference of coronary blood and comparing it to the a-vO2 difference of skeletal muscle blood
• Myocardium & Intermittence pt2:

  • a-vO2 difference is the difference in O2 content in arterial compared to venous blood
  • When arterial O2 content supplying a tissue is recorded directly and compared to the O2 content of venous blood leaving the tissue, the difference corresponds entirely to the amount of O2 extracted and utilised by that tissue