Do blood vessels around the body pulsate at the same time, or is there a noticible delay as the pressure wave propogates from the heart to the rest of the body? (I’m having trouble testing it myself due to a weak wrist pulse).
I’ve had an issue for a while where my hands and feet tend to throb with my pulse. The throbbing (pulsating) in the various limbs happen at the same time, but I just noticed now that it’s not at the same time as the pulses taken at my neck. The neck pulse and extremity throbbing seem to occur at roughly the same pace, but not at the same moment. Is it simply because they’re a different distance from my heart and the pressure wave has to travel through the body’s blood vessels? If so, why would the hand and feet pulsating/throbbing occur simultaneously?
I tried googling but couldn’t come up with much, but Wikipedia’s article on pulse states that the pressure wave in arteries is much faster than the flow of the actual blood, and the pressure wave moves very quickly.
My WAG is since your arms and legs are maybe 1 to 1.5m from your heart, and pulse pressure travels at 3 to 35m/s (depending on which blood vessel it’s in), the pressure wave probably gets to your arms and legs at almost the same time.
Edited to add: I just measured, and my feet are only about half a meter further away from my heart than my wrist is, so their pulses probably arrive at almost the same time.