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Abstract

Introduction: The Mercury sphygmomanometer, a globalgold standard Blood Pressure (BP) recording device isbeing replaced by Automated Wrist, Arm and Fingerdevices due to the hazardous effect of mercury on health.The present study was conducted to test the accuracy ofblood pressure measurements taken with two Automatedblood pressure devices (Arm and Wrist) keeping Mercurysphygmomanometer as the Gold Standard.Materials & Methods: A cross sectional comparativestudy was done in April 2016 on 120 employees ofRehman Medical College aged 20-69 years (mean age34.39 ± 10.49 years), based on convenience sampling andinformed consent; known hypertensive cases and those onanti-hypertensive medication were excluded on account oflability of blood pressure recordings. Two readings wereobtained from both arms and wrists by three trainedresearchers through calibrated Mercury and AutomatedArm and Wrist devices using standard techniques. Datawere analyzed by SPSS 15.0. Comparisons were doneusing T tests and ANOVA, keeping p≤0.05 as significant.Results: Differences in Systolic Blood Pressures (SBP) ofright and left arms were not significant (p>0.05) for eachdevice. However significant differences were obtained(p=0.043) for the right and left upper arm mean DiastolicBlood Pressures (DBP) by Mercury sphygmomanometer.The Automated devices differed significantly (p<0.05) fromthe Mercury device by reporting higher BP values anddiagnosing many more cases of Systolic and Diastolichypertension.Conclusion: The Mercury device provided more accurateand consistent BP readings than the automated ones. Theleft upper arm should be the preferred location for bloodpressure measurements in clinical practice.