What's the highest blood pressure you ever recorded?

Nurses General Nursing Nursing Q/A

I was in intensive care with idiopathic heart failure, kidney failure, pneumonia and water on the lung. I had my BP measured at 340. Apparently, the consultant told my wife that that was the highest bp he has measured on somebody that went on to survive. This was last year, and apart from having regular dialysis, I am perfectly fine, and am back to work full time.

What in your experience is the highest bp of somebody who went on to be OK? I am trying to see if this is a record or not.

Specializes in Oncology.

How was that pressure measured? I can't imagine trusting a cuff measurement at that point. Did you have an art line?

Specializes in CRNA, Finally retired.

You're a nurse on dialysis who works full-time? What is you physical activity level at work? That is remarkable.

I have no idea. I was under sedation at the time, but desperately trying to speak to my wife who had just arrived

I'm not actually a nurse, but a Maths Teacher. I only joined to try and get my question answered.

Specializes in Oncology.

Can anyone speak to the accuracy of noninvasive blood pressures at these levels?

A manual BP would still be accurate wouldn't it? I would never trust the number off a machine for a BP that high. Anything over 180-ish systolic I'll double check with a manual

Specializes in ICU.
blondy2061h said:
Can anyone speak to the accuracy of noninvasive blood pressures at these levels?

That's hard to do - in perfect circumstances, an art line and an automatic cuff are pretty close. I've seen them correlate very well in the 250s systolic before, with a brand-new, freshly zeroed art line. No idea at the 300s, though.

I saw a 320s systolic once. It was on someone we'd turned the sedation off on for a breathing trial to get him off the vent. People get mad when they have a tube down their throats and their hands are tied so they can't pull it out. I've never seen anything that high on someone just walking around or sitting in the bed just relaxing - highest I've seen there is maybe 270.

WOW!! I have never heard or seen that ever

I'd fallen asleep in the chair. Woke up in the morning and coughed. I coughed again and a headache started. A painful very sharp throbbing headache that got worse and worse. When the pain became all consuming I realised that it wasn't right. Rang an ambulance and while sat on the stairs crying and waiting for it to arrive I slapped on my blood pressure meter. It showed 326/189. (It had to rise to 360 before dropping). There didn't feel to be that much pressure on my arm while it pumped up - well there wouldn't be with the pressures being roughly equal. Think it gave me the slightest possible stroke you could have because I couldn't directly touch my nose with one finger from my left hand for over a week.

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