According to a new systematic review and meta-analysis funded by the SPCR, and published in PLOS Medicine, people who monitor their own blood pressure at home are most likely to see a benefit if they combine it with individually tailored intensive support.
Home blood pressure monitoring is currently recommended for people with high blood pressure so health professionals can see if their prescribed treatment is working and make necessary adjustments. While previous research has shown that self-monitoring reduces clinic blood pressure by a small but significant amount, it has remained unclear how best to implement it and for which patients it might be most useful.
In this new study, researchers at the University of Oxford's Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences searched the existing medical literature for all randomized trials including self-monitoring of blood pressure in people with high blood pressure. They then used individual patient data from 25 studies, with up to 10,487 patients in total, to evaluate the effect of self-monitoring on blood pressure levels.