Non-Invasive measurement of blood pressure - Why we should look at BP traces rather than listen to Korotkoff sounds

Accurate non-invasive measurement of blood pressure in unsupervised environments continues to be a challenge, particularly in the presence of movement artefact, electrical noise and most importantly cardiac arrhythmia which are common in those aged over 65 suffering from a range of chronic conditions. Large intra personal variability in signal morphometry and amplitudes further complicates the development of reliable signal processing algorithms for NIBP measurement. In this paper we demonstrate the effect of this variability and propose that the traditional methods of human blood pressure determination by sphygmomanometry should no longer be considered a gold standard for the calibration of NIBP devices.