Accuracy of Automatic BP machines?

Nurses General Nursing

Published

Hey all, just wondering if you ever question the accuracy of the automatic blood pressure machines, especially when compared to manual bp readings.

I understand that cuff fit is important, and that with manual, there may also be user error.

The reason I ask is that I consistently get 130/90 when taken manually at my doctors office, and consistently get 120/80 via automatic machine - I can take this at school (nursing school), and work (hospital).

People say white coat syndrome but I don't know how much I believe that, considering I do not feel anxious at my doctors office.

Assuming there is a discrepancy between the readings of the automatic / manual not caused by white coat syndrome, could this affect our patients readings as well? (assuming your patients are in hospital, having bp taken automatically.

Opinions?

Conventional versus automated measurement of blood press... [bMJ. 2011] - PubMed - NCBI

Here's a quick summary of the use of automatted vs manual in an office setting.

Specializes in Step-down, cardiac.
I work on a cardiac floor and I do not trust the automatic BP's.

How do you handle infection prevention doing it manually? Do you just constantly scrub them with wipes? I also work on a cardiac floor, and we have disposable BP cuffs for each patient for our automatic machines, but our manual ones come with an attached cuff that you would have to reuse for each patient. We use the manual ones for checking if the machine is not registering or appears to be wrong (i.e., an obviously stable and okay pt has a BP of 40/20 or something), but we aren't supposed to use them generally because of infection control issues.

How do you handle infection prevention doing it manually? Do you just constantly scrub them with wipes? I also work on a cardiac floor, and we have disposable BP cuffs for each patient for our automatic machines, but our manual ones come with an attached cuff that you would have to reuse for each patient. We use the manual ones for checking if the machine is not registering or appears to be wrong (i.e., an obviously stable and okay pt has a BP of 40/20 or something), but we aren't supposed to use them generally because of infection control issues.

I always assumed it was standard practice for hospitals to have a manual cuff built into the wall behind the bed. Just have housekeeping put on a new cuff with each discharge..... Problem solved.

Specializes in Orthopedic, LTC, STR, Med-Surg, Tele.

I check a manual BP if the auto BP is out of range or suspicious sounding. Lately I have noticed a lot of artificially low BPs with automatic cuffs, so it's good practice to check, particularly if giving cardiac meds.

Specializes in Step-down, cardiac.
I always assumed it was standard practice for hospitals to have a manual cuff built into the wall behind the bed. Just have housekeeping put on a new cuff with each discharge..... Problem solved.

We used to have that kind of BP cuff, but our hospital got rid of them because of concerns about infection, so now we have disposable cuffs that come sealed, and we give each patient one on admission and throw it away when they go home. Apparently the ones we had built into the wall were not disposable, and they obviously weren't going to throw away a permanent cuff with each patient! :) I actually thought the disposable cuffs were becoming a JCAHO standard, but maybe not--the change to disposables happened before I started working here.

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