Continuous Intra-Arterial Blood Pressure Recording in Human Hypertension

Abstract

Interest in direct and continuous blood pressure recording in human beings stems from the recognition that the method generally employed so far for measuring blood pressure, i.e., the cuff method [25], is encumbered with at least two major limitations. First, as the cuff method makes use of signs indirectly related to the pressure phenomena, it cannot guarantee under all circumstances an accurate estimation of the blood pressure values, in particular of diastolic blood pressure. Second, and more important, the cuff method, even when measurements are frequently repeated in the same subject, provides only a minute fraction of the thousands of blood pressure values that are extant day and night and compose a pressure profile characterized by a considerable degree of variability [16].