Press Release / Health and Fitness / Nine steps to check Blood Pressure manually

Nine steps to check Blood Pressure manually

1 Relax your body before to take the measurement 5 to 10 minutes of relaxing is enough to stabilize the heart rate and blood pressure before measuring Blood Pressure.

Undress Tight Sleeves shirt
Move up your left sleeve or even better to change with a shirt that uncovered your upper arm. Blood Pressure levels should be taken from the LEFT arm, that’s why left sleeve should be uncovered.

2 Cuff wrapping around the upper left arm
Wrap the cuff with taking care of the distance from the elbow that should be one inch approximately and cuff’s lower edge should be one inch above the antecubital fossa. Wrapping of Cuff should be in a proper way so it will be evenly tight around the arm without skin pinching.

3 Ensure the distance between the arm and the tightness of the cuff
With slipping two fingertips underneath, you can check the tightness and the required distance.
If you can be wiggled your two fingertips under the top cuff edge and couldn’t wedge your full fingers beneath the cuff, then the cuff is tight enough and perfect to take the measurement. But If you could wedge your full fingers under the cuff then you required to re-wrap the cuff and make it tighter before closing it again.

4 Placing of the diaphragm(the wide head of the stethoscope) on your on an arm
Diaphragm placement is very important, it needs to be placed flat over the skin inside of left arm. The most important thing is that the edge of the diaphragm needs to beneath the cuff, and positioned over the brachial artery. Put the stethoscope earpieces in your ears. A good way to avoid the thumping sound is to hold the diaphragm with the help of your index and middle finger until you have started to inflate the cuff.

5 Place Pressure gauge to a stable surface or clip to the cuff

Placement of pressure gauge in an adequate light and stable place is important as we need to notice the needle and pressure markings before the test. Sometimes, the pressure gauge comes with an attached rubber bulb, in this case, this step does not apply.

6 Start Inflating the cuff

You need to start squeezing the pump bulb rapidly until no pulse sound comes through the stethoscope. Stop squeezing when the gauge reads 30 to 40 mmHg above your normal blood pressure. Inflate should be in continuity until the gauge reads between 160 to 180 mmHg.
7 Deflation of the cuff

Twist the screw counterclockwise to open the airflow and then Cuff deflation starts. After this, the pressure gauge readings should fall 2 mm, or two lines per second.

8 Systolic and the diastolic reading

Note the readings on your gauge at the exact minute you hear your heart throbbing again. This is your systolic reading.

Note the readings on your gauge at the exact minute the sound of your heart throbbing disappears. This estimation is your diastolic reading.

9 Repeat the test after some rest.

After some time, the cuffs will completely deflate and you need to follow the same steps to take another measurement. If you found blood pressure level high again then compare the readings with the other arm.

When you are not experienced with the steps then mistakes can happen easily, so it’s better to take readings two times to assure with the measurement results.