A simple technique for measuring arterial blood pressures in conscious human subjects

A new technique for measuring blood pressure utilizes the subject's ability to sense the onset and cessation of the Korotkoff phenomenon within the artery itself. Of the readings made in this manner with a standard arm cuff 94% were found to agree within +/- 10 mm Hg with readings made with a stethoscope. And 91% of the blood pressures measured by this technique using an infant cuff on the thumb were found to agree within +/- 10 mm Hg with those measured by the same technique with a standard cuff at the brachial artery. Therefore a simple device was designed with which subjects can measure their own systolic and diastolic blood pressure by utilizing a combined syringe and cuff applied to the thumb. There was a mean systolic difference of 4.7 and a mean diastolic difference of 6.1 mm Hg between readings made on 40 subjects with the new instrument and those made with a mercury sphygmomanometer.