Are Blood Pressure Monitors Accurate?
How critical is it for Blood Pressure Monitors to be accurate?
To some extent doctors have to rely on the monitored-at-home blood pressure ranges while taking history.This especially can be an alarming condition for all since misleading information will lead to wrong diagnosis and hence life threatening consequences.
Why do we even have to rely on Blood Pressure Monitors?
With an ever increasing population and the artificial lifestyle that most of us are adapting to there has been an unpredictable growth in diseases,the one atop them being Blood Pressure.
This means the need for Blood Pressure Monitoring Devices has also skyrocketed be they be manual or automated.
According to a survey in 2018,China experienced a double digit growth in the market of smart blood pressure monitors.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1087995/china-smart-blood-pressure-monitor-market-size/
So if it`s something so many people’s lives are related to we can not help but ask ourselves this Question:
“Are Blood Pressure Monitors Accurate?”
Well!
It depends.
There can be two types of factors affecting the reading shown by your blood pressure monitor;
1.Physiological factors: as to what physical or mental situation you are in which can temporarily compete with you blood pressure monitor.
2.Technical issues: with your blood pressure monitor.
PHYSIOLOGICAL FACTORS:
Your blood pressure changes depending on your circumstances and your surroundings.So to avoid misleading the blood pressure monitor:
- Do not smoke at least 30 mins before the monitoring.It can show you a higher blood pressure.
- Avoid drinking alcohol before for this too can show a higher reading of your blood pressure.
- Avoid drinking any kind of caffeinated beverages or water in general.If feeling the urge,relieve yourself before the blood pressure monitoring because this will also cause the reading to be high.
- To avoid any discrepancy do find the blood pressure in both arms.
- Your arm should be at the level of your heart when performing the blood pressure monitoring.
- Sit quietly in a relaxed state before it is monitored.
- Stress will show you a higher reading on your blood pressure monitor.
- In a partially hypoglycemic state your blood pressure will be shown low.
Technical Issues:
- Most often the blood pressure monitors are not carefully ruled out of error when synthesized in industries.This carelessness renders the blood pressure monitor to be faulty and causes wrong readings to be displayed.
2. In a research it was found that more than 90% blood pressure monitors under test were faulty because they were bought in one region of the sphere but were delivered to some other country they were ordered from.This resulted in discrepancies in the measurement of blood pressures.
Degree of Error:
In 2011,the patients who had kidney problems were asked to bring their blood pressure monitors to the Ottawa hospital to be tested for errors by comparing it to a standard hospital equipment.
The researcher said:
I was taken aback at how inaccurate the blood pressure monitors were!Some of them were 15–20 mm Hg per second off!
WORKING OF BLOOD PRESSURE MONITORS:
Blood pressure monitors convert:
mechanical force exerted by blood against the arterial walls into a ratio.
Blood pressure=Systole/Diastole
Systole: The ventricular contraction which pumps blood in aorta
Diastole: Ventricular relaxation or period when ventricles are getting filled up with blood.
MANUAL VERSUS AUTOMATIC:
Which is more accurate?
It was widely thought that the automated blood pressure monitors are more reliable and accurate than the manual apparatus which made the automated blood pressure monitors to be used more than the manual ones.
In a research conducted to find whether the manual method for blood pressure monitoring was accurate or the automated method it was found that for 10 case studies under observation the researchers came to an interesting conclusion that;
the manual method had beaten the automated method meaning that the automated method for blood pressure monitoring is less accurate.
Takeaway message:
1. Routine checkups of your monitor along with your own:
Taking the monitor to the hospital and getting it checked in comparison to a standard blood pressure monitoring device will help a lot. Along with your own checkups have yearly checkups of your blood pressure monitor too.
2. Find out the average:
To rule out any error find a number of readings and sort out their average.This will be authentic of them all.
3. Upper Arm cuff is better than wrist band:
Cuffs applied to the upper arm are better than wrist bands.Since the arm has much deeper arteries than the wrist which means they are closer to the heart and give the nearly-accurate blood pressure.
Conclusion:
Considering all the researches and the different view points it is rational to say that even the most accurate methods can give variable degree of readings since blood pressure is affected by a number of factors.
So if you standardize your blood pressure monitors often and consider the different factors that affect your blood pressure you probably can rely on the readings you see.In addition to that try to rely more on the manual method for checking blood pressure since very rarely will it be faulty.
