Blood Flow Factors - Video Lesson

Hey, everybody. Welcome to today's lesson on hemodynamics, the study of blood moving through the circulatory system. This lesson focuses on flow volume with discussions about how changes in vessel radius affect resistance and flow as well as the clinical implications of altered flow patterns. In hemodynamics, we can think of how much blood is flowing, flow volume, and how fast blood is flowing, velocity, as flow characteristics. There are many factors that may impact flow characteristics such as resistance, viscosity, changes in the diameter of the vessel, changes in pressure, and pathologies. Resistance refers to the opposition to blood flow. Resistance is impacted by the blood's viscosity, vessel diameter, and blood velocity. Viscosity refers to the thickness or stickiness of the blood, which impacts how easily blood flows through the vessels of the circulatory system. Viscosity is