Evaluation of blood pressure measurement rates among outpatients presenting to a university hospital

Objective: Hypertension is an important health problem that affects the entire population and causes mortality and morbidity. Although there are screening recommendations in different diagnosis and treatment guidelines, there are studies showing that blood pressure measurement is skipped during examination in practice. This study aimed to evaluate the blood pressure measurement status in adults applying to different outpatient clinics in our hospital. Methods: In our cross-sectional-analytical study, the data of patients who applied to the Karadeniz Technical University Farabi Hospital polyclinics for any reason between 01.01.2023 and 01.01.2024 were scanned retrospectively from the hospital information system. Patients who were over 18 years of age with their anamnesis taken and physical examination information completed were included in the study. Patients selected by random sampling method from 24 different branch clinics were included in the study. A sample of 215 people was calculated from each of the clinics. Patients’ age, gender, chronic disease status, medication use information, and blood pressure measurement data were collected. Results: The median age of the 5160 participants was 48 (IQR: 32-62) years. 58.4% (n=3015) of the participants were women. 13.8% of the participants had their blood pressure measured during their outpatient clinic examination. While the departments that performed the most measurements were nephrology, cardiology and general internal medicine, it was observed that none of the patients had their blood pressure measured in ten outpatient clinics, including oncology and neurosurgery. 49.7% (n=354) of the individuals whose blood pressure was measured already had hypertension diagnosis. When blood pressure staging was done according to the blood pressure measurement results, 46.1% (n=328) had increased blood pressure. 77.3% of individuals whose blood pressure was measured in the family practice outpatient clinic did not have a predetermined hypertension diagnosis. Conclusion: The results reveal that the rate of blood pressure measurement, which is a part of the physical examination in outpatient clinics, is much lower than it should be. In order to ensure early diagnosis and blood pressure control of a chronic disease such as hypertension, which is common in society and can have serious complications, every polyclinic visit of the patients should be considered as an opportunity to measure blood pressure.