Influence of cuff material on blood flow restriction stimulus in the upper body

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine the acute skeletal muscle and perceptual responses to blood flow restriction (BFR) exercise to failure between narrow nylon and elastic inflatable cuffs at rest and during exercise. Torque and muscle thickness was measured pre, post, and 5, 20, 40, and 60 min post-exercise with muscle activation being measured throughout exercise. Resting arterial occlusion pressure was different between the nylon [139 (14) mmHg] and elastic [246 (71) mmHg, p < 0.001] cuffs. However, when exercising at 40 % of each cuff's respective arterial occlusion pressure [nylon: 57 (7) vs. elastic: 106 (38) mmHg, p < 0.001], there were no differences in repetitions to failure, torque, muscle thickness, or muscle activation between the cuffs. Exercising with cuffs of different material but similar width resulted in the same acute muscular response when the cuffs were inflated to a pressure relative to each individual cuff.

Acute skeletal muscle responses to very low‐load resistance exercise with and without the application of blood flow restriction in the upper body

“…If not anabolic on its own, the presence of a swelling response may be indicative that a sufficient stimulus was achieved with the resistance training protocol. Our laboratory has observed a remarkably similar acute swelling response across a number of different resistance exercise protocols in the upper (Counts et al, 2015(Counts et al, , 2016Buckner et al, 2017) and lower body . Dankel et al (2017a) noted subtle differences in the acute swelling response, with acute swelling tending to be greater with increasing pressure and intensity when comparing the responses to 10, 15 and 20% 1RM with moderate (40% AOP) and high (80% AOP) restrictive pressures.…”

“…If not anabolic on its own, the presence of a swelling response may be indicative that a sufficient stimulus was achieved with the resistance training protocol. Our laboratory has observed a remarkably similar acute swelling response across a number of different resistance exercise protocols in the upper (Counts et al ., , ; Buckner et al ., ) and lower body (Loenneke et al ., ). Dankel et al .…”

The Cardiovascular and Perceptual Response to Very Low Load Blood Flow Restricted Exercise

“…Blood flow restriction was applied by placing a 5 cm wide nylon cuff (SC5, Hokanson, Bellevue, WA) to the proximal portion of the exercising limb and inflating it to either 40 or 80 % of pre-exercise arterial occlusion. These particular pressures were investigated as they are often used in the blood flow restriction research [4,7,14,27] and both have been shown to elicit muscle adaptation [8,15]. After inflation the participants performed four sets of elbow flexion with one of three experimental loads (10, 15, or 30 % of 1RM).…”

Is there rationale for the cuff pressures prescribed for blood flow restriction exercise? A systematic review

“…Other populations included resistance‐trained adults, adults with musculoskeletal or soft tissue injuries, older adults, or adults with hypertension. There were far more studies (26 of 52) examining only male participants, 17,24,25,30,32‐38,41‐43,46,48,50‐59 compared with just 8 of 52 examining only female participants, 40,49,60‐65 leaving 18 studies examining both of these genders 8,19,20,39,44,45,47,66‐75 …”

“…The prescribed pressure application is a primary variable in the application of BFR, making it of particular importance, and more so for clinical populations when vascular impairments must be considered. This is also relevant to ensure that discomfort caused by the compression of active musculature is minimized without compromising the efficacy of the technique 18‐20 . However, the issue still remains that pressure is inconsistently applied.…”