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Cardiovascular disease‐induced thermal responses during passive heat stress: an integrated computational study
Author(s) -
Zhang Xiancheng,
Noda Shigeho,
Himeno Ryutaro,
Liu Hao
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
international journal for numerical methods in biomedical engineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.741
H-Index - 63
eISSN - 2040-7947
pISSN - 2040-7939
DOI - 10.1002/cnm.2768
Subject(s) - heat stress , stress (linguistics) , computational fluid dynamics , disease , thermal , mechanics , finite element method , materials science , structural engineering , mechanical engineering , engineering , medicine , physics , thermodynamics , atmospheric sciences , linguistics , philosophy
Summary The cardiovascular system plays a crucial role in human thermoregulation; cardiovascular diseases may lead to significantly degrading the thermoregulation ability for patients during exposure to heat stress. To evaluate the thermal responses of patients with common chronic cardiovascular diseases, we here propose an integrated computational model by coupling a two‐node thermoregulation model with a closed‐loop, multi‐compartment, lumped‐parameter cardiovascular model. This bioheat transfer model is validated, capable to predict cardiovascular functions and thermal responses under varying environmental conditions. Our results demonstrate that the cardiovascular disease‐induced reduction in cardiac output and skin blood flow causes extra elevation in core temperature during hyperthermic challenges. In addition, a combination of aging, obesity, and cardiovascular diseases shows a pronounced increase in core temperature during heat exposure, which implies that such combined effect may increase the risk of heat‐related morbidity and mortality. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.