Hi, all. I bought an upper arm blood pressure monitor which I took an appointment with the practice nurse last week to have checked for accuracy and the readings from my monitor and her manual were pretty close so she's happy it's accurate
Now I'm keeping a check on it at home after being put on a new medication and I am wondering if about the best way to do this
I sat at the kitchen table, feet flat on a footstep as I'm too short to put my feet on the ground. Arm flat on the table
I sat at the table for 5 minutes and then took my first reading. Waited 5 minutes and took the second reading and waited 5 minutes before taking a third reading
I got:
154/90 pulse 102
147/85 pulse 97
148/88 pulse 96
If I average the three I get 149/87 and pulse 98. Would that be the correct way to do it? Average the three and mark that as the reading?
Written by
clatow23
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Sounds good to me, but I am no expert. I have a home monitoring kit, and usually it agrees with professional readings. A one-off reading is not as good as an averaged set as far as I can see. Can you talk to your cardio team?
An added suggestion is to take it once in sitting position Wait a couple of mins and then stand up and take it again I find that doing that once a day is enough and then just average them over the week Good luck
I’m not sure I understand the logic of a standing reading The professionals always ask you to sit with feet on the floor and wait 5-10 minutes. That’s how I was trained to take bp.
I have to stress that I have no medical training whatsoever. I used a blood pressure monitor for a period of time after my AVR. However I found that over time I almost became too dependant on the readings and began to worry too much if my readings varied slightly. Depending on your condition I guess it may be beneficial or even very important to check your BP. I did learn one thing though from a nurse friend of mine. For a proper set of readings, you should take readings in both arms, and also seated and standing. This naturally makes the whole process longer, but helps to identify things such as postural changes in your BP.
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