BLOOD-FLOW VELOCITY IN THE UTERINE AND OVARIAN ARTERIES DURING MENSTRUATION

Eleven healthy women with regular menstrual cycles were examined with a combination of two-dimensional real-time ultrasound and color and sp ectral Doppler techniques on the 7th day after follicular rupture, and on the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th days of menstrual bleeding. Both uterine arteries, arteries in the stroma and hila of both ovaries, in the wal l of the largest follicle of the non-dominant ovary and in the wall of the corpus luteum were examined with the Doppler technique. The pulsa tility index (PI) and the time-averaged maximum velocity were calculat ed In the uterine arteries, the PI was highest on the first day of men strual bleeding (median PI 3.2 for the dominant and 3.0 for the non-do minant uterine artery), after which it decreased to its lowest values on the second day (median PI 2.1 and 1.8, respectively) and third day (median PI 2.2 and 2.1, respectively). The time-averaged maximum veloc ity reached its highest value on the second and third days of menstrua tion. The corpus luteum was still visible on the first day of menstrua l bleeding in all women, and on the second day in five. It was indisti nguishable on the third and fourth days of menstruation in all women. In the dominant ovary, the time-averaged maximum velocity of flow in t he arteries in the ovarian hilum decreased during menstrual bleeding a nd was lower during menstruation than in the preceding luteal phase. I n the non-dominant ovary, neither the PI nor the time-averaged maximum velocity manifested any consistent changes during the period studied. We conclude that substantial changes in PI and time-averaged maximum velocity occur in the uterine arteries and in the arteries of the domi nant ovary during menstruation.