Smartphone App May Make BP Monitoring Easier

Blood pressure (BP) measurement and monitoring is nearly 95% accurate using a smartphone app, according to new research.

Cuff-based BP monitoring is uncomfortable and inconvenient for patients and their health care providers. However, new technology called transdermal optical imaging may ease the process.

To evaluate whether this technology can accurately assess BP, the researchers enrolled 1328 normotensive adults in Canada and China. In a controlled environment, the researchers used smartphones enabled with transdermal optical imaging software to take video selfies of participants.

The smartphone camera captured facial blood flow changes and assessed them via an advanced machine-learning algorithm. Data on systolic, diastolic, and pulse pressure was captured and assessed.

This data was then compared with BP measurements taken via cuff-based monitors.

Overall, the results showed that the technology was nearly 95% accurate when measuring systolic BP and nearly 96% accurate when measuring diastolic BP.

“We found that our models predicted blood pressure with a measurement bias±SD of 0.39±7.30 mm Hg for systolic pressure, −0.20±6.00 mm Hg for diastolic pressure, and 0.52±6.42 mm Hg for pulse pressure, respectively,” the researcher wrote.

“Future work will determine whether these models meet the clinically accepted accuracy threshold of 5±8 mm Hg when tested on a full range of blood pressures according to international accuracy standards,” the researchers concluded.

—Amanda Balbi

Reference:

Luo H, Yang D, Barszczyk A, et al. Smartphone-based blood pressure measurement using transdermal optical imaging technology. Circ Cardiovasc Imaging. 2019;12(8). https://dx.doi.org/10.1161/CIRCIMAGING.119.008857.