Impact Of Changes In Tissue Optical Properties On Near-Infrared Diffuse Correlation Spectroscopy Measures Of Skeletal Muscle Blood Flow

Near-infrared diffuse correlation spectroscopy (DCS) is increasingly used to study relative changes in skeletal muscle blood flow. However, most diffuse correlation spectrometers assume that tissue optical properties-such as absorption (mu(a)) and reduced scattering (mu'(s)) coefficients-remain constant during physiological provocations, which is untrue for skeletal muscle. Here, we interrogate how changes in tissue mu(a) and mu'(s) affect DCS calculations of blood flow index (BFI). We recalculated BFI using raw auto-correlation curves and mu(a)/mu'(s) values recorded during a reactive hyperemia protocol in 16 healthy young individuals. First, we show that incorrectly assuming baseline mu(a) and mu'(s) substantially affects peak BFI and BFI slope when expressed in absolute terms (cm(2)/s, P < 0.01), but these differences are abolished when expressed in relative terms (% baseline). Next, to evaluate the impact of physiologic changes in mu(a) and mu'(s), we compared peak BFI and BFI slope when mu(a) and mu'(s) were held constant throughout the reactive hyperemia protocol versus integrated from a 3-s rolling average. Regardless of approach, group means for peak BFI and BFI slope did not differ. Group means for peak BFI and BFI slope were also similar following ad absurdum analyses, where we simulated supraphysiologic changes in mu(a)/mu'(s). In both cases, however, we identified individual cases where peak BFI and BFI slope were indeed affected, with this result being driven by relative changes in mu(a) over mu'(s). Overall, these results provide support for past reports in which mu(a)/mu'(s) were held constant but also advocate for real-time incorporation of mu(a) and mu'(s) moving forward.NEW & NOTEWORTHY We investigated how changes in tissue optical properties affect near-infrared diffuse correlation spectroscopy (NIR-DCS)-derived indices of skeletal muscle blood flow (BFI) during physiological provocation. Although accounting for changes in tissue optical properties has little impact on BFI on a group level, individual BFI calculations are indeed impacted by changes in tissue optical properties. NIR-DCS calculations of BFI should therefore account for real-time, physiologically induced changes in tissue optical properties whenever possible.