Transit-time flow measurement (TTFM) is a precise, highly specialized technology. It’s also one of the most broadly applicable tools in the OR and is used daily across cardiothoracic, vascular, transplant, critical care, and other specialties.
In any procedure where perfusion determines outcomes (and, as you know, that’s all of them), TTFM belongs in the room.
Blood flow is the common thread running through nearly every surgical specialty. Whether the procedure involves the heart, a peripheral limb, a transplanted organ, or a critically ill patient on bypass support, the underlying question is always the same: Is enough blood reaching the tissue?
Transonic’s TTFM technology was built to answer that question quantitatively every time, in real-time. And because it’s a question that arises across so many clinical contexts, Transonic has become a trusted tool well beyond any single specialty.
Cardiothoracic Surgery: Confidence Before Closure
In coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG), a technically precise anastomosis doesn't always guarantee adequate flow. A graft can appear patent and still underperform. TTFM gives surgical teams beat-to-beat flow data for each anastomosis, allowing them to confirm patency on the spot – or identify and correct a problem before closure.
Early detection of a flow issue in the OR is a fundamentally different scenario than discovering it in the ICU. TTFM makes the former far more likely.
Vascular Surgery: Measuring What Matters at the Margins
From femoral-popliteal bypasses to limb salvage procedures, vascular surgery routinely involves flows at the lower end of what most other monitoring technology can detect. And in limb salvage cases especially, the margin between a viable outcome and downstream ischemia is narrow.
A high-velocity Doppler signal through a compromised vessel can offer false reassurance, whereas data about the actual volume of blood reaching the tissue does not. In procedures where micro-level flow can determine limb viability, that distinction is everything.
Transplant Surgery: Certainty When It Matters
Transplantation leaves no room for assumptions. Before closing, the surgical team must confirm that blood is reaching the organ in sufficient volume to support graft survival. TTFM provides that confirmation directly through real-time volumetric data, rather indirect indicators.
Transplant teams use TTFM to assess anastomosis quality, evaluate allograft function, and document restored flow. If perfusion is impaired, that information is available while there's still time to act on it.
ECMO and Critical Care: Flow Monitoring in a Closed Circuit
In ECMO, flow monitoring addresses a specific and serious risk: cannulas blocking distal perfusion, putting limb tissue at risk for ischemia. Transonic's ECMO-specific sensors clip directly onto the circuit tubing and measure flow without interrupting the closed system.
Beyond circuit flow, Transonic offers something particularly significant in this setting: direct monitoring of distal perfusion cannulas. For critical care teams managing patients on prolonged ECMO support, real-time insight is life-changing and limb-saving.
Cerebrovascular Surgery: Precision at the Smallest Scale
In procedures like STA-MCA bypass, aneurysm clipping, or microvascular repair, the vessels involved can be less than a millimeter in diameter.
Transonic's flowprobes are designed for exactly this environment, providing quantitative flow verification in vessels as small as 0.5 mm in both pediatric and adult cases.
Built For Every Speciality That Depends on Flow
Transonic's TTFM technology is trusted in operating rooms, ICUs, transplant centers, and research labs globally. The need to understand true blood flow does not change from one specialty to the next. What changes is how clearly it can be measured.
See how transit-time flow measurement compares to Doppler and why the difference matters.
