1. Field testing in Suriname of two blood pressure-measuring devices for low-resource and middle-resource countries, according to a WHO protocol.
- Author
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Kewalbansing PV, Ishwardat AR, Brewster LM, Oehlers G, and van Montfrans GA
- Subjects
- Adult, Attitude of Health Personnel, Auscultation, Blood Pressure Determination nursing, Body Mass Index, Consumer Behavior, Developing Countries, Equipment Design, Female, Humans, Male, Nurses psychology, Oscillometry, Predictive Value of Tests, Reproducibility of Results, Sensitivity and Specificity, Suriname, Young Adult, Blood Pressure Determination instrumentation, Sphygmomanometers economics
- Abstract
Introduction: High blood pressure (BP) is known to be the greatest modifiable risk factor of cardiovascular diseases, of which 80% occur in low-resource and middle-resource settings. Yet, BP measurement in these countries remains extremely poor. In 2005, a WHO committee invited manufacturers to produce devices especially for use in low-resource settings. Our study assesses the accuracy, performance, and acceptability of two submitted oscillometric devices under field circumstances in Suriname (South America), namely, the Microlife BP 3AS1-2 and Omron HEM-SOLAR., Methods: We compared BP measurements of test devices using a conventional Mercury sphygmomanometer, performed by local healthcare workers under field circumstances. Three hundred and forty-two individuals were included. Statistics included t-tests, analysis of variance, and Bland-Altman plots., Results: The mean systolic/diastolic BP differences (SD) were -3.5 (8.0)/-7.0 (6.0) for Omron versus Mercury and -6.4 (7.8)/-6.5 (6.0) mmHg for Microlife versus Mercury. Microlife was more accepted by healthcare workers, and both devices performed adequately under field conditions., Discussion and Conclusion: The acceptability, durability, and performance of both test devices were adequate. However, Microlife BP 3AS1-2 underestimated systolic pressure almost twice as much compared with Omron HEM-SOLAR, with identical diastolic underestimations. Guaranteed global availability, users could make a choice between the Omron HEM-SOLAR being more accurate in BP measurement, and Microlife BP 3AS1-2 being more accepted by healthcare workers.
- Published
- 2013
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