The relationship between cerebral blood flow and venous sinus pressure: can hyperemia induce idiopathic intracranial hypertension?

Background: It has been shown that idiopathic intracranial hypertension (IIH) in children is associated with cerebral hyperemia, which induces an increase in cerebral venous pressure. The current literature suggests venous pressure scales with blood flow in a linear fashion, however, a linear relationship would not raise the pressure high enough to induce IIH. There is, however, some evidence to suggest that this relationship could be quadratic in nature. The purpose of this paper is to characterize the relationship between cerebral blood flow and the pressure drop across the cerebral venous system. Methods: 10 CT venogram data sets were collected for this study, with 5 useable geometries created. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) models were generated using these geometries, with 10 simulations conducted per patient. The flow rates tested ranged from 200 mL/min to 2000 mL/min. 3D pressure and velocity streamline distributions were created and analyzed for each CFD model, with pressure drops across the cerebral venous system determined. The effective and hydraulic diameters were determined at the superior sagittal sinus, transverse sinus and both proximal and distal sigmoid sinuses. Results: A quadratic relationship between blood flow and sinus pressure was found, with correlations of 0.99 or above in all five patients. The presence of vortical blood flow was found to explain this trend, with fluid curl and pressure drop correlations being above 0.97. This suggests that the presence of high blood flow should be considered in the diagnostic workup of IIH. Conclusions: The cerebral venous sinus blood flow and pressure response relationship are quadratic in nature, with the major cause of this being the degree of rotation induced in the flow. The elevated blood flow found in children with IIH can explain the increased ICP that is found, secondary to the increase in venous pressure that develops.