Routine Blood Pressure Measurement In Psychiatric Research

¹ Research Center, Rockland State Hospital, Orangeburg, N. Y.

In psychiatric research it is generally thought that the more measurements made, the better it is, for great variability is expected to occur in data on psychiatric patients. Our research led us to the conclusion that the appropriate frequency of blood pressure determinations is contrary to what had been the custom. On the basis of an analysis of daily measurements taken over a four-year period, and a newly introduced routine in the past year, we established that a single accurate basal measurement taken when the patient is awake but still in bed in the morning, not having smoked or eaten, in most cases provided as good a weekly index as the average of the seven daily determinations.

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