Claude Franceschi
Claude Franceschi (born October 12, 1942) is an angiologist French MD. Background. After Shigeo Satomura who detected for the first time the blood flow with a Doppler Ultrasound machine, Gene Strandness measured the blood pressure at the ankle (1967), Léandre Pourcelot proposed the Arterial resistivity index (1974), and Gosling the Pulsatility index (1974). Claude Franceschi then tried to analyze more exactly the hemodynamic meaning of the Doppler signal wave from normal and diseased vessels. He published the results at numerous conferences and in the French book ""L'Investigation vasculaire par ultrasonographie Doppler"" ("Vascular Doppler ultrasound investigation") in 1977. Works . Franceschi's major work was to match the principles of fluid mechanics with arterial and venous hemodynamics. After studying the correlations between the Doppler ultrasound, radiological and surgical data, he laid down the methodological and semiotic bases of vascular Doppler ultrasound. According to this theory, varicose veins are not, as well as edema and ulcers, the cause of the venous insufficiency, but the result of venous valves incompetence instead and/or obstacles to the flow. Furthermore, destroying varices in impeding the natural drainage of the skin, would be responsible for relapses by a compensation effect (vicarious shunts). The CHIVA method removes  the overload flow and pressure, resulting in ulcer healing and returning the normal caliber of the veins, including varicose veins. It merely consists in the accurate splitting of the gravitational hydrostatic pressure of the venous column and in the disconnection of closed shunts (depending on the particular configuration of each patient). From 1 to 5 divisions/ligatures are performed under local anesthetics and without hospitalization (ambulatory). In addition, the saphenous veins are saved, a considerable advantage since these veins are the best material for by-passing the peripheral arteries, and completing Coronary artery bypass surgery, more and more necessary for  the aging population. Several randomized controlled trials and a Cochrane Library review have demonstrated CHIVA superiority in certain specific anatomical situations to conventional removal (stripping) of the saphenous vein. The CHIVA technique as a treatment of venous insufficiency is now accepted as the standard of care in those situations where it applies. The CHIVA technique (Guidelines) and Results with Chiva (Guidelines), .