Comparison between a Medical-Grade Device and a Cuffless Consumer-Grade Device for Day and Night Blood Pressure Monitoring

Hypertension affects 1 in 3 adults worldwide and is the leading global cause of death.Most hypertension cases remain undiagnosed, which poses a serious threat to global health.To address this, wearable cuffless devices aim to unobtrusively monitor blood pressure (BP).Our aim was to validate a consumer-grade cuffless wearable blood pressure monitor (WBPM) using a medical-grade ambulatory device (ABPM), for reference.29 participants (range 20-62 years old, 16 females) simultaneously wore the WBPM and ABPM for 24 hours.The ABPM measured at set intervals of 30 or 60 minutes, during day and nighttime respectively.Readings from the WBPM were automatically taken at rest only.Mean and standard deviation of systolic and diastolic BP readings were measured during 24-hours, during day (06:00-22:00) and night (20:00-06:00).Readings were paired if they were taken 10 minutes apart, and if heart rate was within 10bpm.For all intervals, mean systolic and diastolic BP showed a low to moderate correlation (0.27 -0.41), small biases (~ 5 mmHg), large limits of agreement (~ 30 mmHg for systolic and 20 mmHg for diastolic) and median percentage absolute error ~10%.Agreement for standard deviation of BP was poor.This data can help to inform future research into the potential utility of WBPM in hypertension and cardiovascular disease prevention.