Half an hour without coffee or cigarettes
In the previous 30 minutes, do not drink coffee, smoke, eat or exercise.
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- How to measure blood pressure
How to measure blood pressure properly at home
A measurement depends as much on the monitor as on how you sit, when you measure and what you did before. These are the precautions recommended by the 2025 Argentine Consensus on Arterial Hypertension, signed by the SAC, the FAC and the SAHA.
Before measuring
The measurement starts half an hour earlier
What you did in the last few minutes ends up in the number too.
3 to 5 minutes seated
Sit down and stay calm for a few minutes before the first reading.
A quiet place
A room without noise and at a comfortable temperature.
Source: Figure 2 of the 2025 Argentine Consensus on Arterial Hypertension, p. 9.
While measuring
The eight steps
Posture and the cuff, one by one. In the app you go over them with the same pictures before each measurement.
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Don't talk
Not during the measurement, nor between one reading and the next.
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Your arm at heart level
Resting on a table, palm facing down.
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The cuff on your bare arm
Directly on the skin, with no sleeve in between, at the level of the arm's main artery.
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A cuff that fits
Its width should be about 40 % of the circumference of your arm.
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Feet flat on the floor
Both of them, firmly planted.
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Legs uncrossed
Crossing them can raise your pressure.
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An empty bladder
Go to the bathroom before measuring.
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Your back supported
Against the back of the chair, without leaning forward.
Source: Figure 2 of the 2025 Argentine Consensus on Arterial Hypertension, p. 9. Illustrations by Vitalinfo.
How many times and when
A week of measurements says more than a single one
For your doctor to assess your blood pressure at home, the consensus proposes this schedule.
- At least 3 days, and preferably 7.
- Two readings in the morning and two in the evening, 1 to 2 minutes apart.
- In the morning, before breakfast and before taking your blood pressure medication.
- The average includes all of them, except those of the first day.
Source: Table 3 of the 2025 Argentine Consensus on Arterial Hypertension, p. 12.
Each dot is a reading. Those of day 1, hollow, are taken all the same but are left out of the average.
With VitalinfoLog each reading with its time and create a period for that week: with the consensus, the report averages the period without its first day, as the guideline says. If your doctor would rather count it, it is turned off in Settings.
Which monitor
An upper-arm one, automatic and validated
It is the one the consensus recommends for measuring at home.
Source: 2025 Argentine Consensus on Arterial Hypertension, pp. 12 and 13.
- Upper-arm and automatic, with a cuff of your size.
- Validated: the list of validated devices is at stridebp.org.
- Wrist and finger monitors are not the recommended ones.
- Watches and phones without a cuff are not suitable for assessing blood pressure.
Log your measurements in Vitalinfo
Free, on your phone, with these steps at hand and a report ready for your doctor.