Home – Home – Jornals – Siberian Scientific Medical Journal 2018 number 2

Capillaroscopy is simple, non-invasive, safe, and informative technique which provides vital real-time assessment of microvascular structure in various systemic disorders. Major capillaroscopy parameters are capillary density (the number of capillaries in a 1 mm length of the distal row of each finger or toe), capillary width and length, arterial and venous limb diameters, internal diameter, loop diameter, and intercapillary distance. Blood flow velocity in arterial and venous limbs is important as well. Avascular areas may be related to tissue hypoxia, therefore, they have a prognostic value. A homogeneous and ordered distribution of capillaries arranged in parallel and at regular narrow distances between ascending and descending branches is found in capillaroscopy examinations of healthy subjects. A regular capillary is shaped like a hair pin or like the English letter «U» upside-down, with a slimmer arterial arm, an upper part, and a venous arm. The venous arm is larger than the upper part. Capillaroscopy plays an important role in the diagnosis of diseases associated with microcirculation disorders, because it helps to choose the tactics of treatment, to monitor the effectiveness and to predict disease outcomes.