How to Make Good ABPM Blood Pressure Monitor Recordings

The ABPM blood pressure monitor is an effective tool for 24-hour blood pressure control, because it gives information over and above conventional blood pressure meters. However, making good recordings is not easy. In order to do so, some steps should be taken into consideration.

Rules of Making Ideal ABPM Blood Pressure Monitor Recordings

1. Inform the patient about the aim of the ABPM monitoring. The ABPM blood pressure monitor is able to make repeated measurements up to or even over a 24 hour period of time, even at night-time, which supports the identification of non-dippers and away from medical environment, which helps to filter patients with white coat hypertension.

If the patient tends to have white-coat hypertension, which means that his blood pressure is high only in medical setting, there is a possibility to set ABPM blood pressure monitoring to 27 hours. In this way the patient will have enough time to return into normal state after leaving the medical environment.

2. Ask the patient about his daily routine: when he starts and finishes the day. The information is necessary to decide on active (day) and passive (night) ABPM blood pressure monitoring periods.

3. The ABPM blood pressure monitor should be put into a protective carrying case (or pouch), which is fixed to the patient's belt. The carrying case may have straps as well, which should be adjusted to the patient.

4. Selecting the right cuff size is essential for accurate readings. Therefore you need to measure around your upper left arm somewhere around the midpoint between your shoulder and elbow.

Meditech supplies small, normal and large cuffs to its ABPM blood pressure monitors. Small cuff should be used if your arm circumference range is 32 cm maximum; normal cuff should be applied if your range is between 29 – 38 cm and large adult should be used if your range is between 35 – 46 cm.

Wearing a thin shirt under the cuff is recommended, as it can prevent problems caused by long-time wear of the cuff (sweat, itching, soreness).

The cuff should be placed on to the patient's left arm. In general: the ABPM blood pressure montior cuff should cover two-thirds of the distance from the patient's elbow to your shoulder.

The cuff should be properly connected to the ABPM blood pressure monitor. The cuff connector is on the upper side of the device, if it is placed into the carrying case.

5. The patient should avoid excess movement during ABPM blood pressure monitoring, so the arm should be held loose, slightly away from the chest.

6. Should the batteries run down during a monitoring session, they can be dimply replaced. Monitoring will continue and data will not be lost.

Read more on the use of Meditech ABPM-05 blood pressure monitor!