Wednesday, June 09, 2021

my BP monitor is full of shit

So I measure my blood pressure every morning and every evening at about the same time, very soon after waking up and right around 10:45 p.m. This morning, I used my BP monitor to take the morning measurement, and I scored way high—150-something over 90-something. "That can't be right," I thought, so I waited a minute or two and did the measurement again. Sure enough: low 140s over 82. I've long mistrusted BP measurements, whether by doctors or by machines. There seems to be a lot of subjectivity and variability in how blood pressure gets measured. For the moment, though, I think one reason why my BP is all over the place from day to day, aside from natural fluctuations, is that the machine itself is the problem.



2 comments:

  1. I know what you mean about those inexplicable fluctuations. If I get a high reading I do over and it almost always comes down. I'm not sure how sensitive the machine is to things like cuff placement, but I do try and wear it the same every time. What do you do during the actual BP check? I'm usually looking at something on the internet and I wonder if maybe getting agitated impacts the reading. But yeah, I've had doctors check mine twice back-to-back, so maybe they don't trust their machines either.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I usually take a recumbent BP while lying on my bed, although I sometimes also do a sitting BP (as I've done more and more frequently lately). Cuff is always placed in the same position. There's a red arrow on my cuff that serves as a guide.

    ReplyDelete

READ THIS BEFORE COMMENTING!

All comments are subject to approval before they are published, so they will not appear immediately. Comments should be civil, relevant, and substantive. Anonymous comments are not allowed and will be unceremoniously deleted. For more on my comments policy, please see this entry on my other blog.

AND A NEW RULE (per this post): comments critical of Trump's lying must include criticism of Biden's lying on a one-for-one basis! Failure to be balanced means your comment will not be published.