Pulmonary wedge pressure
Estimation of pressure in the heart / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The pulmonary wedge pressure (PWP) (also called pulmonary arterial wedge pressure (PAWP), pulmonary capillary wedge pressure (PCWP), pulmonary artery occlusion pressure (PAOP), or cross-sectional pressure) is the pressure measured by wedging a pulmonary artery catheter with an inflated balloon into a small pulmonary arterial branch.[1] It estimates the left atrial pressure.
Pulmonary venous wedge pressure (PVWP) is not synonymous with the above; PVWP has been shown to correlate with pulmonary artery pressures in studies, albeit unreliably.[citation needed]
Physiologically, distinctions can be drawn among pulmonary artery pressure, pulmonary capillary wedge pressure, pulmonary venous pressure and left atrial pressure, but not all of these can be measured in a clinical context.[2]
Noninvasive estimation techniques have been proposed.[3]