Heart Disease Study: Should Blood Pressure Be Measured in Both Arms?

Heart disease is one of the leading causes of deaths in the United States. It's affected by our diet, stress, physical activity, mental health, etc. Doctors and patients are constantly seeking ways to reduce risk factors and more effectively identify detection.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stay on top of heart disease by releasing annual statistics about the dangers of its prevalence as well as ways to take precautions. One in every four deaths annually are related to heart disease, which adds up to 600,000 per year in the U.S. It's the leading cause of death in both men and women; coronary heart disease is the most common. This type of heart disease contributes to $109 billion in medical costs each year.

This seems to be a bit of a problem, right? Despite this seemingly unsolvable array of issues associated with heart disease, doctors are still tirelessly researching every day to look for answers. A new study conducted by the Framingham Heart Study that has been published in the American Journal of Medicine may have answers for doctors measuring blood pressure.

The researchers examined nearly 3,500 participants aged 40 and older who were free of cardiovascular disease. The focus was on interarm blood pressure and how it can be linked to a greater risk of future cardiovascular events. The researchers found that the participants with higher interarm systolic blood pressure differences above 10 mm Hg possessed a higher risk for heart disease-related events. Systolic blood pressure is "the top number, which is also the higher of the two numbers, measures the pressure in the arteries when the heart beats (when the heart muscle contracts)," as defined on the American Heart Association website.

Based on these findings, the researchers suggest that doctors should record blood pressure in both arms of their patients in order to gain further insight toward the patient's risk of heart disease. By possibly identifying a risk earlier in the process, many more individuals could begin to prevent the numerous effects of heart disease through getting a more accurate reading from interarm blood pressure.