Lactate Increase in Peripheral Artery Disease

To our knowledge, the measurement of the transcutaneous oxygen pressure during walking is the only continuous method that estimates the importance of ischemia, bilaterally and segment of limb by segment of limb. The determination of the lactates concentration, with micro method from earlobe sampling, is very widely validated in physiology and exercise physiopathology; and it is widely used, by laboratories, for exercise investigation in athletes. We use it in routine to evaluate the presence of functional limitation during tcpO2 tests on a treadmill. The present study hypothesises a significant relationship between lactatemia variation (difference between lactatemia after 3 minutes of recovery from walking and the value at rest) and tcpO2 "decrease from rest of oxygen pressure (DROP) values for patients with peripheral artery disease (PAD).