Noninvasive blood pressure measurement in the neonate

Measurements of blood pressure are important in the care of the critically ill neonate. Although direct measurement of mean arterial pressure remains the standard, noninvasive methods provide clinically useful estimations of pressure. Clinicians are often faced with situations where measurements of pressure obtained by direct and indirect methods do not agree. Although the explanation for this is not entirely clear, at least two factors are important: first, direct techniques measure pressure while indirect (noninvasive) methods measure flow; second, neither direct or indirect measurements are straightforward and both are subject to error. Of the noninvasive methods, the oscillometric and Doppler devices appear to be most clinically useful in the newborn intensive care unit.