Re: Portable Wrist Blood Pressure Monitors?

Posted By ALg on March 20, 1999 at 01:55:08:

In Reply to: Portable Wrist Blood Pressure Monitors? posted by Bob on March 17, 1999 at 14:46:39:






I am a 42 yr. old obese male with recently discovered high blood pressure.  I am currently taking 60mg of Adalat cc. I want to monitor my pressure, and bought a wrist monitor (brand name Omron), as the typical arm monitor does not easily fit. Are these wrist devices to be trusted for accurate readings? Thanks...





I have tried both automatic arm and wrist monitors. The arm monitors were giving wrong results usually much lower reading than the manual stetescope
measurements. Probably because my pulses are weak to detect or my arm size is
just about on the max limit for the cuff (although a larger cuff did not help).
I switched to the wrist monitor and so far this has been accurate for me. I checked at the doctors office. Main thing to remember is to keep the monitor at heart level as readingd vary a lot with height.
My model is the OMRON  with the intellisense logic bought at KMART. This measures pressure as it inflates. The first wrist monitor I bought was another brand measured pressure by inflating to 180 and deflating gradually. This, although worked OK most times, it gave way to low readings some times. I dont know whether there is any significance attached to the measurement/inflation mecahnism, just thought I would mention my observation in case it is useful.
Al