Taking Your Blood Pressure at Home [Video] | hioscar Blog | Oscar
Taking Your Blood Pressure at Home [Video]
Dr. Stephanie Reznick returns to "From the Frontlines" with a video on taking your blood pressure at home.
Virtual CareClinically Speaking
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As more and more individuals are seeking health care virtually (opens in new tab), we want to walk you through some basic steps for getting the most out of your visits.
Watch (opens in new tab) as Dr. Stephanie Reznick* returns to "From the Frontlines" with a video on taking your blood pressure at home.
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Taking Your Blood Pressure at Home [Video]
Video Transcript
“Hi everyone, it's Dr. Stephanie Camaglia Reznick. I'm a board-certified internist and one of the medical directors for virtual care here at Oscar.
In this video, I'm going to be discussing how to take your blood pressure at home. With telemedicine use on the rise, you might have a provider you're seeing through telemedicine ask you to take some of your vital signs.
What's a vital sign? Well, it's just that — vital. These are measurements that tell us how your body's doing. Vital signs can include your blood pressure and pulse, which can be measured from a home automated blood pressure cuff. Vital signs can also include your respiratory rate which is how fast you're breathing. Your temperature which, of course, you can check with a thermometer. And how much oxygen is in your blood which is something you can check with something called a pulse oximeter which is just a little thing you put on your finger, very painless, and I'll address that in another video.
Going back to your home blood pressure cuff, when it's time to check your blood pressure, a few things we're trying to get is what your resting or main blood pressure is. Typically, this means that you shouldn't eat or drink, especially anything with caffeine, exercise or smoke for a good 30 minutes before you check your measurement.
Another thing is that you should be sitting and resting quietly for at least five minutes before checking your blood pressure. You want to be sitting with your feet comfortably on the ground and you want to have your arm resting comfortably on a table, preferably one more at heart height.
A few other hints for how to get a good accurate home measurement is that you want to make sure that there's nothing on your arm so if you're wearing long sleeves, you either pull up the sleeve or take off the shirt.
When putting on the blood pressure cuff, there's a few other hints and tips. First, the line that connects to the machine should be down and should be right in the middle of the bend of your arm. You want the blood pressure cuff to be right above that bend, about two centimeters or so. The other thing is when you fold the blood pressure cuff, most cuffs will have this range that says "OK" and when you tighten that band around it, you want to make sure the end of that band ends up somewhere in that "OK" region. If it doesn't, that means the band is either too small or too big. Either way it can make your measurements inaccurate.
Other things to consider is sometimes the blood pressure machine simply isn't accurate. The old school ones that some doctor offices still have where they pump up the blood pressure tends to give us the most accurate readings. Some things as simple as just having a low battery can make the measurement a little bit off.
So, I'm going to show you how to put this on and we'll take it from there. Like I said, you put your arm through and you want the cuff to go right above the bend of your elbow and you want this line to be around the center of your arm. Sometimes I find it helpful to hold it with my fingers down there to keep it roughly where I want while I wrap this part around. This can be the tricky part especially because it can rotate a little bit and you want to try to keep that line in the center. It doesn't have to be perfect but you want it in the center.
Most blood pressure cuffs will have a button that says "Start" or "On" or something along those lines. For the nuances on how your machine works, I recommend you read those instructions that accompany the kit.
So, then you just hit start and while taking the blood pressure, again, you want your feet on the ground sitting down comfortably resting and no talking. The other thing is to try not to get too nervous while it's measuring your blood pressure as that can give you a falsely elevated reading. I'm going to go ahead and take mine now. It does take a few minutes so bear with me.
So, what does a blood pressure reading mean?
Well, normal is 120 over 80 or less. There's a little bit of give room between 120 to 130 over the top where it's considered elevated but not really high blood pressure — or the medical term is hypertension. Then if the bottom number is between 80 to 90, that's considered stage 1 and above 90 is stage 2. For the top number, or the systolic number, that is between 130 and 140 is stage 1 and above 140 is stage two.
The systolic blood pressure — what does that mean? Yes, it's the top number. What's that telling us? If you think of your arteries as being a hose connected to your heart and your blood pressure is measuring what is that pressure inside that artery for that hose, when the heart is contracting and pushing that blood out, that is your systolic measurement. That's why it's higher.
Your diastolic measurement, or the one on the bottom, is when the heart's relaxing and filling up with blood. That's where you get your systolic and diastolic blood pressure. Going back to the numbers, if it's elevated, don't panic. Take it again.
How high is too high?
180 over 120 is generally the cut off for what we call hypertensive urgency which means you need immediate medical attention, not necessarily the emergency room but you definitely need to call your provider to discuss next steps.
If you have any symptoms meaning a really bad headache, chest pain, shortness of breath, if your blood pressure is elevated even if it's not up to that 180 over 120 but it's elevated, then you need to be seen in person immediately. That is called hypertensive emergency potentially and you really need to get checked out as soon as possible.
What is your goal blood pressure?
Well, even though 120 over 80 is considered the normal cutoff, for some people normal is 130 over 80 and others are 140 over 90 or less. The specific goal should be determined between you and your provider and things like what medical conditions you have or how sensitive you are to low blood pressure will affect what the goal is for you.
What can you do to make your blood pressure lower?
Having a low salt or sodium diet especially the DASH diet can help. Doing aerobic exercises regularly can also help bring down your blood pressure. If you feel like stress is contributing to your high blood pressure, doing stress-reducing techniques ranging from meditation to yoga to whatever works for you can also help. For those who need medications, there are many medications available and the specifics can be discussed between you and your provider.”
Video published 2020-08-28
This content does not constitute medical advice and is not meant to be a substitute for professional medical advice, including diagnosis or treatment. Contact your physician with any questions you may have regarding COVID-19 or your personal health. If you are experiencing a medical emergency, dial 911 for immediate assistance.
*Virtual Providers are employed by Oscar Medical Group and are not employed by Oscar Insurance.
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